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PATIENCE WORTH 



A PSYCHIC MYSTERY 



By 

CASPER S. YOST 




NEW YORK 

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 

1916 



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COFTBIOHT, 1916 
BT 

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 



Published February, 1916 



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PREFACE 

The compiler of this book is not a spirit- 
ualist, nor a psychologist, nor a member of 
the Society for Psychical Research; nor has 
he ever had anything more than a transitory 
and skeptical interest in psychic phenomena of 
any character. He is a newspaper man whose 
privilege and pleasure it is to present the facts 
in relation to some phenomena which he does 
not attempt to classify nor to explain, but 
which are virtually without precedent in the 
record of occult manifestations. The mystery 
of Patience Worth is one which every reader 
may endeavor to solve for himself. The sole 
purpose of this narrative is to give the visible 
truth, the physical evidence, so to speak, the 
things that can be seen and that are therefore 
susceptible of proof by ocular demonstration. 

In this category are the instruments of com- 

m 



iv PREFACE 

munication and the communications them- 
selves, which are described, explained and, in 
some cases, interpreted, where an effort at in- 
terpretation seems to be desirable. 



CONTENTS 




The Coming of Patience Worth . 


PAGE 
1 


Nature of the Communications . 


9 


Personality of Patience 


. 37 


The Poetry 


63 


The Prose . . . . . 


. 107 


Conversations .... 


. 173 


Religion 


. 223 


The Ideas on Immortality . 


. 247 


Index 


. 287 



THE COMING OF PATIENCE 
WORTH 

Upon a July evening in 1913 two women 
of St. Louis sat with a ouija board upon their 
knees. Some time before this a friend had 
aroused their interest in this unfathomable 
toy, and they had since whiled away many an 
hour with the inscrutable meanderings of the 
heart-shaped pointer; but, like thousands of 
others who had played with the instrument, 
they had found it, up to this date, but little 
more than a source of amused wonder. The 
messages which they had laboriously spelled 
out were only such as might have come from 
the subconsciousness of either one or the other, 
or, at least, were no more strange than innu- 
merable communications which have been re- 
ceived through the reading of the ouija board. 

But upon this night they received a visitor. 
The pointer suddenly became endowed with 



« PATIENCE WORTH 

an unusual agility, and with great rapidity 
presented this introduction: 

" Many moons ago I lived. Again I come. 
Patience Worth my name." 

The women gazed, round-eyed, at each other, 
and the board continued: 

" Wait. I would speak with thee. If thou 
shalt live, then so shall I. I make my bread by 
thy hearth. Good friends, let us be merrie. 
The time for work is past. Let the tabbie 
drowse and blink her wisdom to the fire- 

log." 

*' How quaint that is!" one of the women 
exclaimed. 

" Good Mother Wisdom is too harsh for 
thee," said the board, " and thou shouldst love 
her only as a foster mother." 

Thus began an intimate association with 
" Patience Worth " that still continues, and 
a series of communications that in intellectual 
vigor and literary quality are virtually without 
precedent in the scant imaginative litera- 
ture quoted in the chronicles of psychic phe- 
nomena. 



THE COMING OF PATIENCE WORTH 3 

The personality of Patience Worth — if per- 
sonality it may be called — so impressed itself 
upon these women, at the first visit, that they 
got pencil and paper and put down not only 
all that she transmitted through the board, 
but all the questions and comment that elicited 
her remarks; and at every meeting since 
then, a verbatim record has been made 
of the conversation and the communica- 
tions. 

These records have accumulated until they 
have filled several volumes of typewritten 
pages, and upon them, and upon the writer's 
personal observations of the workings of the 
phenomena, this narrative is based. They 
include conversations, maxims, epigrams, alle- 
gories, tales, dramas, poems, all the way from 
sportive to religious, and even prayers, most of 
them of no little beauty and of a character 
that may reasonably be considered unique in 
literature. 

The women referred to are Mrs. John H. 
Curran, wife of the former Immigration Com- 



4> PATIENCE WORTH 

missioner of Missouri, and Mrs. Emily Grant 
Hutchings, wife of the Secretary of the Tower 
Grove Park Board in St. Louis, both ladies of 
culture and refinement. Mrs. Curran is a 
young woman of nervous temperament, bright, 
vivacious, ready of speech. She has a taste for 
literature, but is not a writer, and has never 
attempted to write anything more ambitious 
than a personal letter. Mrs. Hutchings, on 
the other hand, is a professional writer of skill, 
and it was to her quick appreciation of the 
quality of the communications that the start- 
ing of the record is due. It was soon apparent, 
however, that it was Mrs. Curran who was the 
sole agent of transmission ; for the communica- 
tions came only when she was at the board, 
and it mattered not who else sat with her. 
During the first months only Mrs. Curran and 
Mrs. Hutchings sat, but gradually the circle 
widened, and others assisted Mrs. Curran. 
Sometimes as many as five or six would sit with 
her in the course of an evening. Mr. Curran 
has acted as amanuensis, and recorded the com- 
munications at most of the sittings, Mrs. Cur- 



THE COMING OF PATIENCE WORTH 5 

ran's mother, Mrs. Mary E. Pollard, occa- 
sionally taking his place. 

The ouija board is a rectangular piece of 
wood about 16 inches wide by 24 inches in 
length and half an inch thick. Upon it the 
letters of the alphabet are arranged in two 
concentric arcs, with the ten numerals below, 
and the words " Yes " and " No " at the upper 
corners. The planchette, or pointer, is a thin, 
heart-shaped piece of wood provided with 
three legs, upon which it moves about upon 
the board, its point indicating the letters of 
the words it is spelling. Two persons are 
necessary for its operation. They place the 
tips of their fingers lightly upon the pointer 
and wait. Perhaps it moves; perhaps it does 
not. Sometimes it moves aimlessly about the 
board, spelling nothing; sometimes it spells 
words, but is unable to form a sentence; but 
often it responds readily enough to the im- 
pulses which control it, and even answers ques- 
tions intelligibly, occasionally in a way that 
excites the wonder and even the awe of those 



6 PATIENCE WORTH 

about it. Its powers have been attributed by 
some to supernatural influence, by others to 
subconsciousness, but science has looked upon 
it with disdain, as, until recent years, science 
has looked upon nearly all unprecedented 
phenomena. 

Mr. W. T. Carrington, an eminent English 
investigator of psychical phenomena, in an 
exhaustive work upon the subject, has this to 
say of the ouija board: " Granting for the sake 
of argument that the board is moved by the 
sitter, either consciously or unconsciously, the 
great and vital question still remains : What is 
the intelligence behind the board, that directs 
the phenomena? Whoever sets out to give a 
final and decisive answer to this question in the 
present state of our knowledge will have his 
task cut out for him, and I wish him happiness 
in the undertaking. Personally I am attempt- 
ing nothing of the kind." 

The ouija board has been in use for many 
years. There is no element of novelty in the 
mere fact that curious and puzzling messages 
are received bj^ means of it. I emphasize this 



THE COMING OF PATIENCE WORTH 7 

fact because I wish to place the board in its 
proper relation to the communications from 
the intelligence calling herself Patience 
Worth. Aside from the psychical problem 
involved — and which, so far as the board is 
concerned, is the same in this case as in many 
others — the ouija board has no more signifi- 
cance than a pen or a pencil in the hand. It is 
merely an instrument for the transmission of 
thought in words. In comparison with the per- 
sonality and the literature which it reveals in 
this instance, it is a factor of little significance. 
It is proper to say, however, at this point, 
that every word attributed to Patience Worth 
in this volume was received by Mrs. Curran 
through this instrument. 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICA- 
TIONS 

" He who bulldeth with peg and cudgel but buildeth 
a toy for an age who will but cast aside the bauble as 
naught; but he who buildeth with word, a quill and 
a fluid, buildeth well." — Patience Worth. 

There are a number of things that dis- 
tinguish Patience Worth from all other " in- 
telligences " that have been credited with 
conmiunications pretending to come from a 
spiritual source. First is her intellect. One 
of the strongest arguments against the gen- 
uineness of such communications has been 
the lack of intelligence often displayed in 
them. They have largely been, though with 
many exceptions, crude emanations of weak 
mentalities, and few of the exceptions have 
shown greater intellect or greater knowledge 

than is possessed by the average human being. 

9 



10 PATIENCE WORTH 

In a work entitled, " Is Death the 
End?" Dr. John H. Holmes, an eminent 
New York divine, gives considerable space 
to the psychic evidence of immortality. In 
the com-se of his discussion of this phase of 
his subject he concisely describes the character- 
istic features of psychic communications. 
" Nobody," he says, " can study the evidence 
gathered in this particular field without notic- 
ing, first of all, the triviality, almost the in- 
anity, of the communications received. Here 
we come, eager for the evidence of future life 
and information as to what it means to die and 
pass into the great beyond. And what do we 
get? First of all — and naturally enough, per- 
haps — frantic efforts on the part of the alleged 
spirits to prove their identity by the citation 
of intricate and unimportant details of where 
they were and what they did at different times 
when they were here among men. Sometimes 
there is a recounting of an event which is 
taking place in a part of the world far re- 
moved from the locality in which the medium 
and the recipient are sitting. Again and 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 11 

again there is a descent to obscurity and feeble 
chattering." 

I quote this passage, not merely because 
it so clearly states the experience and con- 
clusions of many who have investigated these 
phenomena, but because it serves to show 
by its marked contrast the wonder of 
the communications from Patience Worth. 
There are no efforts on her part to prove 
her identity. On the contrary, she can 
rarely be induced to speak of herself, and the 
personal information she has reluctantly given 
is disappointingly meager. " About me," she 
says, " thou wouldst know much. Yesterday 
is dead. Let thy mind rest as to the past." 
She never speaks of her own acts as a physical 
being; she never refers to any event taking 
place in the world now or that has taken place 
in the past. But far more important than 
these, she reveals an intellect that is worthy 
of any man's respect. It is at once keen, swift, 
subtle and profound. There is not once but 
always a " sustained level of clear thought and 
fine feeling." There is obscurity at times, but 



12 PATIENCE WORTH 

it is usually the obscurity of profundity, and 
intelligent study generally reveals a meaning 
that is worth the effort. There is never a 
" focusing of attention upon the affairs of this 
world," except for the purpose of displaying 
its beauties and its wonders, and to assist in 
explaining the world that she claims is to 
come. For that other world she seems to try 
to explain as far as some apparent limitations 
permit, speaks as few have spoken before, and 
her words often bring delight to the mind and 
consolation to the soul. 

Before considering these communications in 
detail, it would be well for the reader to be- 
come a little better acquainted with the al- 
leged Patience herself. I speak of her as a 
person, for whatever she, or it, may be, the 
impression of a distinct personality is clear and 
definite; and it is, besides, more convenient 
so to designate her. Patience as a rule 
speaks an archaic tongue that is in general the 
English language of about the time of the 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 13 

Stuarts, but which contains elements of a 
usage still more ancient, and, not rarely, word 
and phrase forms that seem never to have 
been used in English or in any English dialect. 
Almost all of her words, however, whether in 
conversation or in literary composition, are 
of pure Anglo-Saxon-Norman origin. There is 
seldom a word of direct Latin or Greek parent- 
age. Virtually all of the objects she refers to 
are things that existed in the seventeenth cen- 
tury or earlier. In all of the great mass of 
manuscript that has come from her we have not 
noticed a single reference to an object of mod- 
ern creation or development; nor have more 
than a dozen words been found in her writings 
that may be of later origin than the seven- 
teenth century, and some of these words are 
debatable. She has shown, in what would 
seem to be a genuinely feminine spirit of 
perversity, that she can use a modern word if 
she chooses to do so. And if she is living now, 
no matter when she was on earth, why should 
she not? (She has twice used the word 



14. PATIENCE WORTH 

" shack," meaning a roughly constructed 
cabin, a word which is in that sense so new and 
so local that it has but recently found a place 
in the dictionaries.) But the fact remains that 
the number of such words is so small as to be 
negligible. 

Only one who has tried to write in archaic 
English without committing anachronisms can 
realize its tremendous difficulty. We are so 
saturated with words and idioms of modern 
origin that it is almost impossible wholly to 
discard them, even when given every advan- 
tage of time and reflection. How much more 
difficult must it be then to use and maintain 
such language without an error in ordinary 
impromptu conversation, answering questions 
that could not have been expected, and flash- 
ing repartee that is entirely dependent upon 
the situation or remarks of the moment. Yet 
Patience does this with marvelous facility. So 
she can hardly be Mrs. Curran. 

All of her knowledge of material things 
seems to be drawn from English associations. 
She is sm^prisingly familiar with the trees and 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 15 

flowers, the birds and beasts of England. She 
knows the manners and customs of its people 
as they were two or three centm'ies ago, the 
people of the fields or the people of the 
palace. Her speech is filled with references to 
the furniture, utensils and mechanical contriv- 
ances of the household of that time, and to 
its articles of dress, musical instruments, and 
tools of agriculture and the mechanical arts. 
There are also a few indications of a knowl- 
edge of New England life. Yet she has never 
admitted a residence in England or New Eng- 
land, has never spoken of a birthplace or an 
abiding place anywhere, has never, in fact, 
used a single geographical proper name in re- 
lation to herself. 

The communications of Patience Worth 
come in a variety of forms : Conversation that 
is strewn with wit and wisdom, epigrams and 
maxims ; poems by the hundred ; parables and 
allegories; stories of a semi-dramatic char- 
acter, and dramas. 

Here is an example of her conversation from 



16 PATIENCE WORTH 

one of the early records — an evening when a 
skeptical friend, a young physician, somewhat 
disposed to the use of slang, was present with 
his wife. 

As the ladies took the board, the doctor re- 
marked : 

" I hope Patience Worth will come. I'd like 
to find out what her game is." 

Patience was there and instantly responded : 

" Dost, then, desire the plucking of another 
goose? " 

Doctor, — " By George, she's right there with 
the grease, isn't she? " 

Patience, — " Enough to baste the last upon 
the spit." 

Doctor, — " Well, that's quick wit for you. 
Pretty hard to catch her." 

Patience, — " The salt of today will not serve 
to catch the bird of tomorrow." 

Doctor, — " She'd better call herself the bird 
of yesterday. I wonder what kind of a mind 
she had, anyway." 

Patience, — " Dost crave to taste the sauce? " 

Doctor, — " She holds to her simile of the 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 17 

goose. I Avish you'd ask her how she makes 
that httle table move under your hands to 
spell the words." 

Patience. — " A wise cook telleth not the 
brew." 

Doctor, — " Turn that board over and let me 
see what's under it." 

This was done, and after his inspection it 
was reversed. 

Patience, — " Thee'lt bump thy nose to look 
within the hopper." 

Doctor. — " Whew! She doesn't mind hand- 
ing you one, does she? " 

Mrs. Pollard. — " That's Patience's way. 
She doesn't think we count for /anything." 

Patience. — " The bell-cow doth deem the 
good folk go to Sabboth house from the ring- 
ing of her bell." 

Doctor. — " She evidently thinks we are a 
conceited lot. Well, I believe she'll agree with 
me that you can't get far in this world without 
a fair opinion of yourself." 

Patience. — " So the donkey loveth his 
bray!" 



18 PATIENCE WORTH 

The Doctor s Wife, — " You can draw her 
on all you please. I'm going to keep perfectly 
still." 

Patience, — " Oh, e'en the mouse will have a 
nibble." 

Mrs, Curran, — " There! She isn't going to 
let you off without a little roast. I wonder 
what she has to say to you." 

Patience. — " Did'st ever see the brood hen 
puff up with self-esteem when all her chicks 
go for a swim? " 

Doctor. — " Let's analyze that and see if 
there's anything in it." 

Patience. — " Strain the potion. Mayhap 
thou wilt find a fly." 

This will be sufficient to illustrate Patience's 
form of speech and her ready wit. It also 
shows something of the character of the people 
to whom and through whom she has usually 
spoken. They are not solemn investigators nor 
" pussy-footed " charlatans. There is no cere- 
mony about the sitting, no dimmed lights, no 
compelled silences, no mummeries of any sort. 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 19 

The assistance is of the ordinary, fun-loving, 
somewhat irreverent American type. The 
board is brought into the living-room under the 
full glare of the electric lamps. The men 
perhaps smoke their cigars. If Patience 
seems to be in the humor for conversation, all 
may take part, and she hurls her javelins im- 
partially. A visitor is at once brought within 
the umbra of her wit. 

Her conversation, as already indicated, is 
filled with epigrams and maxims. A book 
could be made from these alone. They are, 
of course, not always original. What maxims 
are? But they are given on the instant, with- 
out possibility of previous thought, and are 
always to the point. Here are a few of these 
prompt aphorisms: 

" A lollypop is but a breeder of pain." 
" An old goose gobbles the grain like a 
gosling." 

" Dead resolves are sorry fare." 

" The goose knoweth where the bin leaketh." 

" Quills of sages were plucked from geese." 



^0 PATIENCE WORTH 

" Puddings fit for lords would sour the belly 
of the swineboy." 

" To clap the cover on a steaming pot of 
herbs will but modify * the stench." 

" She who quacketh loudest deems the gan- 
der not the lead at waddling time." 

" Climb not the stars to find a pebble." 

" He who hath a house, a hearth and a friend 
hath a lucky lot." 

She is often caustic and incisive. 

" A man loveth his wife, but, ah, the buckles 
on his knee breeks ! " 

" Should I present thee with a pimipkin, 
wouldst thou desire to count the seeds? " 

" A drink of asses' milk would nurture the 
swine, but wouldst thou then expect his song 
to change from Want, Want, Want?" 

" Some folk, hke the bell without a clapper, 
go clanging on in good faith, believing the good 
folk can hear them." 

" Were I to tell thee the pudding string 

* A word of this degree of latinity is very rare with her. 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 21 

were a spinet's string, thou wouldst make 
ready for the dance." 

" Thee'lt tie thy God within thy kerchief, 
else have none of Him, and like unto a bat, 
hang thyself topsy-turvy to better view His 
handiwork." 

" 'T would pleg thee sore should thy shadow 
wear cap and bells." 

" From constant wishing the moon may tip 
for thee." 

" Wouldst thou have a daisy blossom upon 
a thistle? " 

" Ye who carry pigskins to the well and lace 
not the hole are a tiresome lot." 

" He who eateth a bannock well made flat- 
tereth himself should his belly not sour." 

Aside from the dramatic compositions, some 
of which are of great length, most of the com- 
munications received from Patience have been 
in verse. There is rarely a rhyme, practically 
all being iambic blank verse in lines of irregu- 
lar length. The rhythm is almost uniformly 
smooth. At some sittings the poetry begins 



2£ PATIENCE WORTH 

to come as soon as the hands are placed upon 
the planchette, and the evening is given over to 
the production of verse. At others, verses are 
mingled with repartee and epigram, but sel- 
dom is an evening spent without at least one 
poem coming. This was not the case in the 
earlier months, when many sittings were given 
up wholly to conversation. The poetry has 
gi'adually increased in volume, as if the earlier 
efforts of the influence had been tentative, 
while the responsiveness of the intermediary 
was being tested. So, too, the earlier verses 
were fragments. 

A blighted bud may hold 
A sweeter message than the loveliest flower. 
For God hath kissed her wounded heart 
And left a promise there. 

A cloak of lies maj clothe a golden truth. 
The sunlight's warmth may fade its glossy black 
To whitening green and prove the fault 
Of weak and shoddy dye. 

Oh, why let sorrow steel thy heart.'' 
Thy busom is but its foster mother, 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 23 

The world its cradle, and the loving home 
Its grave. 

Weave sorrow on the loom of love 
And warp the loom with faith. 

Such fragments, however, were but steps 
leading to larger things. A little later on this 
came: 

So thou hast trod among the tansey tuft 

And murr and thyme, and gathered all the garden's 

store, 
And glutted on the lillie's sensuous sweet. 
And let thy shade to mar the sunny path. 
And only paused to strike the slender humming bird. 
Whose molten-tinted wing but spoke the song 
Of fluttering joy, and in thy very hand 
Turned to motley gray. Then thinkest thou 
To build the garden back by trickery ? 

And then, some six months after her first 
visit, came the poem which follows, and which 
may be considered the real beginning of her 
larger works: 

Long lines of leaden cloud; a purple sea; 
White gulls skimming across the spray. 



S4 PATIENCE WORTH 

Oh dissonant cry ! Art thou 
The death cry of desire? 

Ah, wail, ye winds. 

And search ye for my dearest wish 

Along the rugged coast, and down 

Where purling waters whisper 

To the rosy coral reef. 

Ah, search! Ah, search! 

And when ye return, bring ye the answering. 

Do I stand and call unto the sea for answer? 

Ah, wisdom, where art thou? 

A gull but shows thee to the Southland, 

And leaden sky but wameth thee of storm. 

And wind, thou art but a changeling. 

So, shall I call to thee? Not so. 

I build not upon the spray, 

And seek not within the smaller world, 

For God dwelleth not abroad, but deep within. 

There is spiritual significance, more or less 
profound, in nearly all of the poems. Some 
of the lines are obscure, but study reveals a 
meaning, and the more I, at least, study them, 
the more I have been impressed with the in- 
tellectual power behind them. It is this that 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 25 

makes these communications seem to stand 
alone among the numerous messages that 
are alleged to have come from " that undis- 
covered country." 

An intense love of nature is expressed in 
most of the communications, whether in prose 
or verse, and also a wide knowledge of 
nature— not the knowledge of the scientist, but 
tliat of the poet. 

All silver-laced with web and crystal-studded, hangs 

A golden lily cup, as airy as a dancing sprite. 

The moon hath caught a fleeting cloud, and rests in 

her embrace. 
The bumblefly still hovers o'er the clover flower. 
And mimics all the zephyr's song. White butterflies. 
Whose wings bespeak late wooing of the buttercup. 
Wend home their way, the gold still clinging to their 

snowy gossamer. 
E'en the toad, who old and moss-grown seems. 
Is wabbled on a lilypad, and watches for the moon 
To bid the cloud adieu and light him to his hunt 
For fickle marsh flies who tease him through the day. 
Why, every rose has loosed her petals, 
And sends a pleading perfume to the moss 
That creeps upon the maple's stalk, to tempt it hence 



26 PATIENCE WORTH 

To bear a cooling draught. Round yonder trunk 

The ivy clings and loves it into green. 

The pansy dreams of coaxing goldenrod " 

To change her station, lest her modest flower 

Be ever doomed to blossom 'neath the shadow of the 

wall. 
And was not He who touched the pansy 
With His regal robes and left their color there, 
All-wise to leave her modesty as her greatest charm .^ 
Here snowdrops blossom 'neath a fringe of tuft, 
And fatty grubs find rest amid the mold. 
All love, and Love himself, is here. 
For every garden is fashioned by his hand. 
Are then the garden's treasures more of worth 
Than ugly toad or mold? Not so, for Love 
May tint the zincy blue-gray ifiurk 
Of curdling fall to crimson, light-flashed summertide. 
Ah, why then question Love, I prithee, friend.'* 

This is poetry, but there is something more 
than liquid sweetness in its lines. There is a 
truth. Deeper wisdom and a lore more pro- 
found and more mystical are revealed or deli- 
cately concealed in some of the others. 

I searched among the hills to find His love, 
And found but waving trees, and stones 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 27 

Where lizards flaunt their green and slip to cool 

Adown the moss. I searched within the field 

To find His treasure-trove, and found but tasseled 

stalk 
And baby grain, encradled in a silky nest. 
I searched deep in the rose's heart to find 
His pledge to me, and steeped in honey, it was there. 
Lo, while I wait, a vagabond with goss'mer wing 
Hath stripped her of her loot and borne it all to me. 
I searched along the shore to find His heart, 
Ahope the lazy waves would bear it me ; 
And watched them creep to rest upon the sands, 
Who sent them back again, asearch for me. 
I sought amid a tempest for His strength. 
And found it in its shrieking glee ; 
And saw man's paltry blocks come crashing down, 
And heard the wailing of the trees who grew 
Afeared, and, moaning, caused the flowers to quake 
And tremble lest the sun forget them at the dawn ; 
While bolts shot clouds asunder, and e'en the sea 
Was panting with the spending of his might. 
I searched within a wayside cot for His white soul. 
And found a dimple next the lips of one who slept. 
And watched the curtained wonder of her eyes. 
Aflutter o'er the iris-colored pools that held His 

smile : 
And touched the warm and shrinking lips, so mute. 



28 PATIENCE WORTH 

And yet so wise. For canst thou doubt whose kiss 
Still lingers on their bloom? 

Amid a muck of curse, and lie, 
And sensuous lust, and damning leers, 
I searched for Good and Light, 
And found it there, aye, even there ; 
For broken reeds may house a lark's pure nest. 
I stopped me at a pool to rest. 
And toyed along the brink to pluck 
The cress who would so guard her lips : 
And flung a stone straight to her heart, 
And, lo, but silver laughter mocketh me ! 
And as I stoop to catch the plash, 
Pale sunbeams pierce the bower. 
And ah, the shade and laughter melt 
And leave me, empty, there. 
But wait ! I search and find, 
Reflected in the pool, mysolf, the searcher. 
And, on the silver surface traced. 
My answer to it all. 

For, heart of mine, who on this journey 
Sought with me, I knew thee not, 
But searched for prayer and love amid the rocks 
Whilst thou but now declare thyself to me. 
Ah, could I deem thee strong and fitting 
As the tempest to depict His strength; 
Or yet as gentle as the smile of baby lips, 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 29 

Or sweet as honeyed rose or pure as mountain pool? 
And yet thou art, and thou art mine — 
A gift and answer from my God. 

It is not my purpose to attempt an extended 
interpretation of the metaphysics of these 
poems. This one will repay real study. No 
doubt there will be varied views of its meaning. 

These poems do not all move with the mur- 
muring ripple of running brooks. Some of 
them, appalling in the rugged strength of their 
figures of speech, are like the storm waves 
smashing their sides against the cliffs. In my 
opinion there are not very many in literature 
that grip the mind with greater force than the 
first two lines of the brief one which follows, 
and there are few things more beautiful than 
its conclusion: 

Ah, God, I have drunk unto the dregs, 

And flung the cup at Thee! 

The dust of crumbled righteousness 

Hath dried and soaked unto itself 

E'en the drop I spilled to Bacchus, 

Whilst Thou, all-patient, 

Sendest purple vintage for a later harvest. 



30 PATIENCE WORTH 

The poems sometimes contain irony, gentle 
as a smnmer zephyr or crushing as a mailed 
fist. For instance tliis challenge to the vain- 
glorious ; 

Strike ye the sword or dip ye in an inken well; 

Smear ye a gaudy color or daub ye the clay? 

Aye, beat upon thy busom then and cry, 

" ^Tis mine, this world-love and vainglory ! " 

Ah, master-hand, who guided thee? Stay! 

Dost know that through the ages. 

Yea, through the very ages. 

One grain of hero dust, blown from afar, 

Hath lodged, and moveth thee? 

Wait. Wreathe thyself and wait. 

The green shall deepen to an ashen brown 

And crumble then and fall into thy sightless eyes, 

While thy moldering flesh droppeth awry. 

Wait, and catch thy dust. 

Mayhap thou canst build it back! 

She touches all the strings of human emo- 
tion, and frequently thrums the note of sorrow, 
usually, however, as an overtm^e to a paean of 
joy. The somber tones in her pictures, 
to use another metaphor, are used mainly to 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 31 

strengthen the high lights. But now and then 
there comes a verse of sadness such as this one, 
which yet is not wholly sad: 

Ah, wake me not ! 
For should my dreaming work a spell to soothe 
My troubled soul, wouldst thou deny me dreams ? 

Ah, wake me not ! 
If 'mong the leaves wherein the shadows lurk 
I fancy conjured faces of my loved, long lost; 
And if the clouds to me are sorrow's shroud; 
And if I trick my sorrow, then, to hide 
Beneath a smile ; or build of wasted words 
A key to wisdom's door — wouldst thou deny me? 

Ah, let me dream I 
The day may bring fresh sorrows. 
But the night will bring new dreams. 

When this was spelled upon the board, its 
pathos affected Mrs. Curran to tears, and, to 
comfort her. Patience quickly applied an anti- 
dote in the following jingle, which illustrates 
not only her versatility, but her sense of 
humor: 

Patter, patter, briney drops, 
On my kerchief drying: 



Sa PATIENCE WORTH 

Spatter, spatter, salty stream, 
Down my poor cheeks flying. 
Brine enough to 'merse a ham, 
Salt enough to build a dam! 
Trickle, trickle, all ye can 
And wet my dry heart's aching. 
Sop and sop, 'tis better so, 
For in dry soil flowers ne'er grow. 

This little jingle answered its purpose. 
Mrs. Curran's tears continued to fall, but they 
were tears of laughter, and all of the little 
party about the board were put in good spirits. 
Then Patience dryly remarked : 

" Two singers there be; he who should sing 
like a troubadour and brayeth like an ass, and 
he who should bray that singeth." 

These examples will serve to illustrate the 
nature of the communications, and as an intro- 
duction to the ntimerous compositions that will 
be presented in the course of this narrative. 

The question now arises, or, more likely, it 
has been in the reader's mind since the book was 
opened: What evidence is there of their gen- 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 33 

uineness? Does Mrs. Curran, consciously or 
subconsciously, produce this matter? It is 
hardly credible that anyone able to write such 
poems would bother with a ouija board to 
do it. 

It will probably be quite evident to a 
reader of the whole matter that whoever or 
whatever it is that writes this poetry and 
prose, possesses, as already intimated, not only 
an unusual mind, but an unusual knowledge of 
archaic forms of English, a close acquaintance 
with nature as it is found in England, and a 
familiarity with the manners and customs of 
English life of an older time. Many of the 
words used in the later compositions, par- 
ticularly those of a dramatic nature, are 
obscure dialectal forms not to be found in any 
work of literature. All of the birds and flow- 
ers and trees referred to in the communica- 
tions are native to England, with the few ex- 
ceptions that indicate some knowledge of New 
England. No one not growing up with the 
language used could have acquired facility in 
it without years of patient study. No one 



34? PATIENCE WORTH 

could become so familiar with English nature 
without long residence in England; for the 
knowledge revealed is not of the character that 
can be obtained from books. Mrs. Curran has 
had none of these experiences. She has never 
been in England. Her studies since leaving 
school have been confined to music, to which 
art she is passionately attached, and in which 
she is adept. She has never been a student of 
literature, ancient or modern, and has never 
attempted any form of literary work. She 
has had no particular interest in English his- 
tory, English literature or English life. 

But, it may be urged, this matter might be 
produced subconsciously, from Mrs. Curran's 
mind or from the mind of some person asso- 
ciated with her. The phenomena of subcon- 
sciousness are many and varied, and the word 
is used to indicate, but does not explain, nu- 
merous mysteries of the mind which seem 
wholly baffling despite this verbal hitching 
post. But I have no desire to enter into an 
argument. My sole purpose is so to present 
the facts that the reader may intelligently form 



NATURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS 35 

his own opinion. Here are the facts that relate 
to this phase of the subject: 

Mrs. Curran does not go into a trance when 
the communications are received. On the con- 
trary, her mind is absolutely normal, and she 
may talk to others while the board is in opera- 
tion under her hands. It is unaffected by con- 
versation in the room. There is no effort at 
mental concentration. Aside from Mrs. Cur- 
ran, it does not matter who is present, or 
who sits at the board with her; there are sel- 
dom the same persons at any two successive 
sittings. Yet the personality of Patience is 
constant and unvarying. As to subconscious 
action on the part of Mrs. Curran, it would 
seem to be sufficient to say that no one can 
impart knowledge subconsciously, unless it 
has been first acquired through the media of 
consciousness; that is to say, through the 
senses. No one, for example, who had never 
seen or heard a word of Chinese, could speak 
the language subconsciously. One may uncon- 
sciously acquire information, but it must be 
through the senses. 



36 PATIENCE WORTH 

It remains but to add that the reputation 
and social position of the Currans puts them 
above the suspicion of fraud, if fraud were at 
all possible in such a matter as this; that Mrs. 
Curran does not give public exhibitions, nor 
private exhibitions for pay; that the composi- 
tions have been received in the presence of their 
friends, or of friends of their friends, all spe- 
cially invited guests. There seems rothing ab- 
normal about her. She is an intelligent, con- 
scientious woman, a member of the Episco- 
palian church, but not especially zealous in 
affairs of religion, a talented musician, a clever 
and witty conversationalist, and a charming 
hostess. These facts are stated not as gratui- 
tous compliments, but as evidences of character 
and temperament which have a bearing upon 
the question. 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 

« Yea, I be me." 

Patience, as I have said, has given very 
little information about herself, and every ef- 
fort to pin her to a definite time or locality 
has been without avail. When she first intro- 
duced herself to Mrs. Curran, she was asked 
where she came from, and she replied, " Across 
the sea." Asked when she lived, the pointer 
groped among the figures as if struggling with 
memory, and finally, with much hesitation 
upon each digit, gave the date 1649. This 
seemed to be so in accord with her language, 
and the articles of dress and household use to 
which she referred, that it was accepted as a 
date that had some relation to her material 
existence. But Patience has since made it 
quite plain that she is not to be tied to any 
period. 

37 



38 PATIENCE WORTH 

" I be like to the wind," she says, " and 
yea, like to it do blow me ever, yea, since 
time. Do ye to tether me unto today I 
blow me then tomorrow, and do ye to 
tether me mito tomorrow I blow me then 
today." 

Indeed, she at times seems to take a mis- 
chievous delight in baffling the seeker after 
personal information ; and at other times, when 
she has a composition in hand, she expresses 
sharp displeasure at such inquiries. As this 
is not a speculative work, but a narrative, the 
attempt to fix a time and place for her will be 
left to those who may find interest in the task. 
All that can be said with definiteness is that 
she brings the speech and the atmosphere, as 
it were, of an age or ages long past; that she 
is thoroughly English, and that while she can 
and does project herself back into the mists 
of time, and speak of early medieval scenes as 
familiarly as of the English renaissance, she 
does not make use of any knowledge she may 
possess of modern developments or modern 
conditions. And yet, archaic in word and 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 39 

form as her compositions are, there is some- 
thing very modern in her way of thought and 
in her attitude toward nature. An eminent 
philologist asked her how it was that she used 
the language of so many different periods, and 
she replied: " I do plod a twist of a path and 
it hath run from then till now." And when 
he said that in her poetry there seemed to be 
echoes or intangible suggestions of compara- 
tively recent poets, and asked her to explain, 
she said: " There be aneath the every stone a 
hidden voice. I but loose the stone and lo, the 
voice! " 

But while the archaic form of her speech and 
writings is an evidence of her genuineness, and 
she so considers it, she does not approve of its 
analysis as a philological amusement. " I brew 
and fashion feasts," she says, " and lo, do ye 
to tear asunder, thee wouldst have but grain 
dust and unfit to eat. I put not meaning to 
the tale, but source thereof." That is to say, 
she does not wish to be measured by the form 
of her words, but by the thoughts they convey 
and the source from which they come. And 



40 PATIENCE WORTH 

she has put this admonition into strong and 
striking phrases. 

" Put ye a value 'pon word? And weigh ye 
the line to measure, then, the gift o' Him 'pon 
rod afashioned out by man? 

" I tell thee. He hath spoke from out the 
lowliest, and man did put to measure, and lo, 
the lips astop! 

"And He doth speak anew; yea, and He 
hath spoke from out the mighty, and man doth 
whine o' track ashow 'pon path he knoweth not 
— and lo, the mighty be astopped! 

" Yea, and He ashoweth wonders, and man 
findeth him a rule, and lo, the wonder shrink- 
eth, and but the rule remaineth ! 

" Yea, the days do rock with word o' Him, 
and man doth look but to the rod, and lo, the 
word o' Him asinketh to a whispering, to die. 

" And yet, in patience, He seeketh new days 
to speak to thee. And thou ne'er shalt see His 
working. Nay ! 

" Look ye unto the seed o' the olive tree, 
aplanted. Doth the master, at its first burst 
athrough the sod, set up a rule and murmur 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 41 

him, * 'Tis ne'er an olive tree! It hath but a 
pulp stem and winged leaves? ' Nay, he let- 
teth it to grow, and nurtureth it thro' days, and 
lo, at finish, there astandeth the olive tree ! 

" Ye'd uproot the very seed in quest o' root! 
I bid thee nurture o' its day astead. 

" I tell thee more : He speaketh not by line 
or word ; Nay, by love and giving. 

" Do ye also this, in His name." 

But, aside from the meagerness of her 
history, there is no indefiniteness in her 
personality, and this clear-cut and unmis- 
takable individuality, quite different from 
that of Mrs. Curran, is as strong an evi- 
dence of her genuineness as is the unique- 
ness of her literary productions. To speak 
of something which cannot be seen nor heard 
nor felt as a personality, would seem to be a 
misuse of the word, and yet personality is much 
more a matter of mental than of physical char- 
acteristics. The tongue and the eyes are 
merely instruments by means of which per- 
sonality is revealed. The personality of Pa- 



4^ PATIENCE WORTH 

tience Worth is manifested through the instru- 
mentahty of a ouija board, and her striking 
individuality is thereby as vividly expressed as 
if she were present in the flesh. Indeed, it 
requires no effort of the imagination to visual- 
ize her. Whatever she may be, she is at hand. 
Nor does she have to be solicited. The moment 
the fingers are on the board she takes com- 
mand. She seems fairly to jump at the oppor- 
tunity to express herself. 

And she is essentially feminine. There are 
indubitable evidences of feminine tastes, emo- 
tions, habits of thought, and knowledge. She 
is^ for example, profoundly versed in the meth- 
ods of housekeeping of two centuries or more 
ago. She is familiar with all the domestic ma- 
chinery and utensils of that olden time — the 
operation of the loom and the spinning wheel, 
the art of cooking at an open hearth, the sand- 
ing of floors ; and this homely knowledge is the 
essence of many of her proverbs and epi- 
grams. 

" A good wife," she says, " keepeth the floor 
well sanded and rushes in plenty to burn. The 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 43 

pewter should reflect the fire's bright glow; 
but in thy day housewifery is a sorry trade/' 

At another time she opened the evening 
thus: 

" I have brought me some barley corn and 
a porridge pot. May I then sup? " 

And the same evening she said to Mrs. Pol- 
lard : 

" Thee'lt ever stuff the pot and wash the 
dishcloth in thine own way. Alackaday! Go 
brush thy hearth. Set pot aboiling. Thee'lt 
cook into the brew a stuff that tasteth full well 
unto thy guest." 

A collection of maxims for housekeepers 
might be made from the flashes of Patience's 
conversation. For example : 

" Too much sweet may spoil the short 
bread." 

" Weak yarn is not worth the knitting." 

" A pound for pound loaf was never known 
to fail." 

" A basting but toughens an old goose." 

These and many others like them were used 
by her in a figurative sense, but they reveal an 



U PATIENCE WORTH 

intimate knowledge of the household arts and 
appliances of a forgotten time. If she knows 
anything of stoves or ranges, of fireless cook- 
ers, of refrigerators, of any of the thousand 
and one utensils which are familiar to the 
modern housewife, she has never once let slip 
a word to betray such knowledge. 

At one time, after she had delivered a poem, 
the circle fell into a discussion of its meaning, 
and after a bit Patience declared they were 
" like treacle dripping," and added, " thee'lt 
find the dishcloth may make a savory stew." 

" She's roasting us," cried Mrs. Hutch- 
ings. 

" Nay," said Patience, " boiling the pot." 

" You don't understand our slang, Pa- 
tience," Mrs. Hutchings explained. " Roast- 
ing means criticising or rebuking." 

" Yea, basting," said Patience. 

Mrs. Pollard remarked : " I've heard my 
mother say, ' He got a basting! ' " 

" An up-and-down tm^n to the hourglass 
does to a turn," Patience observed dryly. 

" I suppose she means," said Mrs. Hutch- 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 45 

ings, " that two hours of basting or roasting 
would make us understand." 

" Would she be likely to know about hour- 
glasses? " Mrs. Curran asked. 

Patience answered the question. 

" A dial beam on a sorry day would make a 
muck o' basting." Meaning that a sundial was 
of no use on a cloudy day. 

But Patience is not usually as patient with 
lack of understanding as this bit of conversa- 
tion would indicate. 

" I dress and baste thy fowl," she said once, 
" and thee wouldst have me eat for thee. If 
thou wouldst build the comb, then search thee 
for the honey." 

" Oh, we know we are stupid," said one. 
" We admit it." 

" Saw drip would build thy head and fill thy 
crannies," Patience went on, " yet ye feel smug 
in wisdom." 

And again: " I card and weave, and ye look 
a painful lot should I pass ye a bobbin to 
wind." 



46 PATIENCE WORTH 

A request to repeat a doubtful line drew 
forth this exclamation: " Bother! I fain would 
sew thy seam, not do thy patching." 

At another time she protested against a dis- 
cussion that interrupted the dehvery of a 
poem: " Who then doth hold the distaff from 
whence the thread doth wind ? Thou art shut- 
tling 'twixt the woof and warp but to mar the 
weaving." 

And once she exclaimed, " I sneeze on rust 
o' wits!" 

But it must not be understood that Patience 
is bad-tempered. These outbreaks are quoted 
to show one side of her personality, and they 
usually indicate impatience rather than anger: 
for, a moment after such caustic exclamations, 
she is likely to be talking quite genially or dic- 
tating the tenderest of poetry. She quite 
often, too, expresses affection for the family 
with which she has associated herself. At one 
time she said to Mrs. Curran, who had ex- 
pressed impatience at some cryptic utterance 
of the board : 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 47 

" Ah, weary, weary me, from trudging and 
tracking o'er the long road to thy heart ! Wilt 
thou, then, not let me rest awhile therein? " 

And again: " Should thee let thy fire to em- 
ber I fain would cast fresh faggots." 

And at another time she said of Mrs. Cur- 
ran: " She doth boil and seethe, and brew and 
taste, but I have a loving for the wench." 

But she seems to think that those with 
whom she is associated should take her love 
for granted, as home folks usually do, and she 
showers her most beautiful compliments upon 
the casual visitor who happens to win her 
favor. To one such she said: 

" The heart o' her hath suffered thorn, but 
bloomed a garland o'er the wounds." 

To a lady who is somewhat deaf she paid 
this charming tribute: 

" She hath an ear upon her every finger's 
tip, and 'pon her eye a thousand flecks o' 
color for to spread upon a dreary tale and 
paint a leaden sky aflash. What need she o' 
ears? " 

And to another who, after a time at the 



48 PATIENCE WORTH 

board, said she did not want to weary Pa- 
tience : 

" Weary then at loving of a friend? Would 
I then had the garlanded bloom o' love she 
hath woven and lighted, I do swear, with 
smiling washed brighter with her tears." 

And again: " I be weaving of a garland. 
Do leave me then a bit to tie its ends. I 
plucked but buds, and woe! they did spell but 
infant's love. I cast ye, then, a blown bloom, 
wide petaled and rich o' scent. Take thou 
and press atween thy heart throbs — ^my gift." 

Of still another she said: " She be a star- 
bloom blue that nestleth to the soft grasses 
of the spring, but ah, the brightness cast to 
him who seeketh field aweary!" 

And yet again: "Fields hath she trod 
arugged, aye, and weed agrown. Aye, and 
e'en now, where she hath set abloom the blos- 
soms o' her very soul, weed aspringeth. And 
lo, she standeth head aliigh and eye to sky 
and faith astrong. And foot abruised still 
troddeth rugged field. But I do promise ye 
'tis such an faith that layeth low the weed 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 49 

and putteth 'pon the rugged path asmoothe, 
and yet but bloom shalt show, and ever shalt 
she stand, head ahigh and eye unto the sky." 

Upon an evening after she had showered 
such comphments upon the ladies present she 
exclaimed : 

" I be a wag atruth, and lo, my posey- 
wreath be stripped!" 

She seldom favors the men in this way. 
She has referred to herself several times as a 
spinster, and this may account for a certain 
reluctance to saying complimentary things of 
the other sex. " A prosy spinster may but 
plash in love's pool," she remarked once, and 
at another time she said : " A wife shall brush 
her goodman's blacks and polish o' his buckles, 
but a maid may not dare e'en to blow the 
trifling dust from his knickerbockers." With 
a few notable exceptions, her attitude toward 
men has been expressed in sarcasm, none the 
less cutting to those for whom she has an 
affection manifested in other ways. To one 
such she said: 



50 PATIENCE WORTH 

" Thee'lt peg thy shoes, lad, to best their 
wearing, and eat too freely of the fowl. Thy 
belly needeth pegging sore, I wot." 

" Patience doesn't mean that for me," he 
protested. 

"Nay," she said, "the jackass ne'er can 
know his reflection in the pool. He deemeth 
the thrush hath stolen of his song. Buy thee 
a pushcart. 'Twill speak for thee." 

And of this same rotund friend she re- 
marked, when he laughed at something she 
had said: 

" He shaketh like a pot o' goose jell! " 

" I back up. Patience," he cried. 

" And thee'lt find the cart," she said. 

Of a visitor, a physician, she had this to 
say: 

" He bindeth and asmears and looketh at a 
merry, and his eye doth lie. How doth he 
smite and stitch like to a wench, and brew o'er 
steam! Yea, 'tis atwist he be. He runneth 
whither, and, at a beconing, (beckoning) 
yon, and ever thus; but 'tis a blunder-mucker 
he be. His head like to a steel, yea, and 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 51 

heart a summer's cloud athin (within), 
enough to show athrough the clear o' blue." 

But it is upon the infant that Patience be- 
stows her tenderest words. Her love of child- 
hood is shown in many lines of rare and touch- 
ing beauty. 

" Ye seek to level unto her," she said of a 
baby girl who was present one evening, " but 
thou art awry at reasoning. For he who put- 
teth him to babe's path doth track him high, 
and lo, the path leadeth unto the Door. Yea, 
and doth she knock, it doth ope. 

" Cast ye wide thy soul's doors and set 
within such love. For, brother, I do tell thee 
that though the soul o' ye be torn, aye, and 
scarred, 'tis such an love that doth heal. The 
love o' babe be the balm o' earth. 

" See ye! The sun tarrieth 'bout the lips o' 
her; aye, and though the hand be but thy fin- 
ger's span, 'tis o' a weight to tear away thy 
heart." 

And upon another occasion she revealed 
something of herself in these words : 



52 PATIENCE WORTH 

Know ye ; in my heart's mansion 

There be apart a place 

Wherein I treasure my God's gifts. 

Think ye to peer therein? Nay. 

And should thee by a chance 

To catch a stolen glimpse, 

Thee'dst laugh amerry, for hord (hoard) 

Would show but dross to thee : 

A friend's regard, ashrunked and turned 

To naught — but one bright memory is there; 

A hope — now dead, but showeth gold hid there ; 

A host o' nothings — dreams, hopes, fears; 

Love throbs afluttered hence 

Since first touch o' baby hands 

Caressed my heart's store ahidden. 

Returning to the femininity of Patience, it is 
also shown in her frequent references to dress. 
Upon an evening when the pubhcation of her 
poems had been under discussion, when next 
the board was taken up she let them know that 
she had heard, in this manner: 

"My pettieskirt hath a scallop," she said. 
" Mayhap that will help thy history." 

" Oh," cried Mrs. Curran, " we are discov- 
ered!" 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 53 

" Yea," laughed Patience — she must have 
laughed, " and tell thou of my buckled boots 
and add a cap-string." 

Further illustrative of her feminine char- 
acteristics and of her interest in dress, as well 
as of a certain fun-loving spirit which now 
and then seems to sway her, is this record of a 
sitting upon an evening when Mr. Curran and 
Mr. Hutchings had gone to the theater, and 
the ladies were alone: 

Patience, — " Go ye to the lighted hall to 
search for learning? Nay, 'tis a piddle, not a 
stream, ye search. Mayhap thou sendest thy 
men for barleycorn. 'Twould then surprise 
thee should the asses eat it." 

Mrs. H, — " What is she driving at? " 

Mrs, P, — " The men and the theater, I sup- 
pose." 

Mrs, H, — " Patience, what are they seeing 
up there? " 

Patience. — " Ne'er a timid wench, I 



vum." 



Mrs, C, — " You don't approve of their go- 
ing, do you, Patience? " 



54 PATIENCE WORTH 

Patience. — " Thee'lt find a hearth more 
profit. Better they cast the bit of paper." 

Mrs. C. — "What does she mean by paper? 
Their programmes ? " 

Patience. — " Painted parchment squares." 

Mrs. P. — " Oh, she means they'd better stay 
at home and play cards." 

Mrs. H. — " Are they hkely to get their 
morals corrupted at that show? " 

Patience. — " He who tickleth the ass to start 
a braying, fain would carol with his brother." 

Mrs. C. — " If the singing is as bad as it 
usually is at that place, I don't wonder at her 
disapproval. But what about the girls, Pa- 
tience? " 

Patience. — " My pettieskirt ye may borrow 
for the brazens." 

BIrs. P. — " Now, what is a pettieskirt? Is 
it really a skirt or is it that ruff they used to 
wear around the neck? " 

Patience. — " Nay, my bib covereth the neck- 
band." 

BIrs. H. — " Then, where do you wear your 
pettieskirt? " 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 55 

Patience. — " 'Neath my kirtle." 

Mrs, C, — " Is that the same as girdle? Let's 
look it up." 

Patience, — " Art fashioning thy new 
frock?" 

Mrs, H, — " I predict that Patience will 
found a new style — Puritan." 

Patience. — " 'Twere a virtue, egad! " 

Mrs, H, — " You evidently don't think much 
of our present style. In your day women 
dressed more modestly, didn't they? " 

Patience, — " Many's the wench who pulled 
her points to pop. But ah, the locks were 
combed to satin ! He who bent above might see 
himself reflected . " 

Mrs, C, — " What were the young girls of 
your day like, Patience? " 

Patience, — " A silly lot, as these of thine. 
Wait!" 

There was no movement of the board for 
about three minutes, and then: 

" 'Tis a sorry lot, not harming but bore- 
some!" 



56 PATIENCE WORTH 

Mrs. H. — " Oh, Patience, have you been to 
the theater? " 

Patience, — " A peep in good cause coul^ 
surely ne'er harm the godly." 

Mrs. C. — " How do you think we ought to 
look after those men? " 

Patience, — " Thine ale is drunk at the 
hearth. Surely he who stops to sip may bless 
the firelog belonging to thee." 

When the men returned home they agreed 
with the verdict of Patience before they had 
heard it, that it was a " tame " show, " not 
harming, but boresome." 

The exclamation of Mrs. Curran, " Let's 
look it up," in the extract just quoted from the 
record, has been a frequent one in this circle 
since Patience came. So many of her words 
are obsolete that her friends are often com- 
pelled to search through the dictionaries and 
glossaries for their meaning. Her reference to 
articles of dress — wimple, kirtle, pettieskirt, 
points and so on, had all to be " looked up." 
Once Patience began an evening with this 
remark : 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 57 

" The cockshut finds ye still peering to find 
the other land." 

" What is cock's hut? " asked Mrs. H. 

" Nay," said Patience, " Cock-shut. Thee 
needeth light, but cockshut bringeth dark." 

" Cockshut must mean shutting up the cock 
at night," suggested a visitor. 

" Aye, and geese, too, then could be put to 
quiet," Patience exclaimed. " Wouldst thou 
wish for cockshut? " 

Search revealed that cockshut was a term 
anciently applied to a net used for catching 
woodcock, and it was spread at nightfall, hence 
cockshut acquired also the meaning of early 
evening. Shakespeare uses the term once, in 
Richard III., in the phrase, " Much about 
cockshut time," but it is a very rare word in 
literature, and probably has not been used, 
even colloquially, for centuries. 

There are many such words used by Pa- 
tience — relics of an age long past. The writer 
was present at a sitting when part of a ro- 
mantic story-play of medieval days was being 
received on the board. One of the characters 



58 PATIENCE WORTH 

in the story spoke of herself as " playing the 
jane-o'-apes." No one present had ever heard 
or seen the word. Patience was asked if it had 
been correctly received, and she repeated it. 
Upon investigation it was found that it is a 
feminine form of the familiar jackanapes, 
meaning a silly girl. Massinger used it in one 
of his plays in the i^feventeenth century, but 
that appears to be the only instance of its use 
in literature. 

These words may be not unknown to many 
people, but the point is that they were totally 
strange to those at the board, including Mrs. 
Curran — words that could not possibly have 
come out of the consciousness or subconscious- 
ness of any one of them. The frequent use 
of such words helps to give verity to the archaic 
tongue in which she expresses her thoughts, 
and the consistent and unerring use of this 
obsolete form of speech is, next to the char- 
acter of her literary production, the strongest 
evidence of her genuineness. It will be no- 
ticed, too, that the language she uses in con- 
versation is quite different from that in her 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 59 

literary compositions, although there are defi- 
nite similarities which seem to prove that 
they come from the same source. In this also 
she is wholly consistent: for it is unquestion- 
ably true that no poet ever talked as he wrote. 
Every writer uses colloquial words and idioms 
in conversation that he would never employ in 
literature. No matter what his skill or genius 
as a writer may be, he talks " just like other 
people." Patience Worth in this, as in other 
things, is true to her character. 

It may be repeated that in all this matter 
— and it is but a skimming of the mass — one 
may readily discern a distinct and striking per- 
sonality; not a wraith-like, formless, evanes- 
cent shadow, but a personality that can be 
clearly visualized. One can easily imagine 
Patience Worth to be a woman of the Puri- 
tan period, with, however, none of the severe 
and gloomy beliefs of the Puritan — a woman 
of a past age stepped out of an old picture and 
leaving behind her the material artificialities of 
paint and canvas. From her speech and her 



60 PATIENCE WORTH 

^vxitings one may conceive her to be a woman 
of Northern England, possibly: for she uses 
a number of ancient words that are found to 
have been peculiar to the Scottish border; a 
country woman, perhaps, for in all of her com- 
munications there are only two or three refer- 
ences to the city, although her knowledge and 
love of the drama may be a point against this 
assimiption; a woman who had read much in 
an age when books were scarce, and women 
who could read rarer still: for although she 
frequently expresses disdain of book learning, 
she betrays a large accumulation of such learn- 
ing, and a copious vocabulary, as well as a de- 
gree of skill in its use, that could only have 
been acquired from much study of books. " I 
have bought beads from a pack," she says, 
" but ne'er yet have I found a peddler of 
words." 

And then, after we have mentally material- 
ized this woman, and given her a habitation 
and a time, Patience speaks again, and all has 
vanished. " Not so," she said to one who ques- 
tioned her, " I be abirthed awhither and abide 



PERSONALITY OF PATIENCE 61 

me where." And again she hkened herself to 
the wind. " I be like the wind," she said, " who 
leaveth not track, but ever 'bout, and yet like 
to the rain who groweth grain for thee to 
reap." At other times she has indicated that 
she has never had a physical existence. I have 
quoted her saying: " I do plod a twist o' a path 
and it hath run from then till now." At a later 
time she was asked what she meant by that. 
She answered: 

" Didst e'er to crack a stone, and lo, a worm 
aharded? (a fossil). 'Tis so, for list ye, I 
speak like ye since time began." 

It is thus she reveals herself clearly to the 
mind, but when one attempts to approach too 
closely, to lay a hand upon her, as it were, she 
invariably recedes into the unfathomable deeps 
of mysticism. 



THE POETRY 

Am I a broken lyre, 
Who, at the Master's touch, 
Respondeth with a tinkle and a whir? 
Or am I strung in full 

And at His touch give forth the full chord? 

— Patience Worth. 

As the reader will have observed, the poetry 
of Patience Worth is not confined to a single 
theme, nor to a group of related themes. It 
covers a range that extends from inanimate 
things through all the gradations of material 
life and on into the life of spiritual realms as 
yet uncharted. It includes poems of senti- 
ment, poems of nature, poems of humanity; 
but the larger number deal with man in rela- 
tion to the mysteries of the beyond. All of 
them evince intellectual power, knowledge of 
nature and human nature, and skill in con- 
struction. With the exception of one or two 
little jingles, the poems are rhymeless. Pa- 

63 



V 



64. PATIENCE WORTH 

tience may not wholly agree with Milton that 
rhyme " is the invention of a barbarous age to 
set off wretched matter and lame metre," 
but she seldom uses it, finding in blank verse a 
medium that suits all her moods, making it at 
will as light and ethereal as a summer cloud or 
as solemn and stately as a Wagnerian march. 
She molds it to every purpose, and puts it to 
new and strange uses. Who, for example, ever 
saw a lullaby in blank verse? It is, I believe, 
quite without precedent in literature, and yet 
it would not be easy to find a lullaby more 
daintily beautiful than the one which will be 
presented later on. 

In all of her verse, the iambic measure is 
dominant, but it is not maintained with mo- 
notonous regularity. She appreciates the 
value of an occasional break in the rhythm, and 
she understands the uses of the pause. But 
she declines to be bound by any rules of line 
measurement. Many of her lines are in accord 
with the decasyllabic standard of heroic verse, 
but in no instance is that standard rigidly ad- 
hered to: some of the lines contain as many 



THE POETRY 65 

as sixteen syllables, others drop to eight or 
even six. 

It should be explained, however, that the 
poetry as it comes from the ouija board is not 
in verse form. There is nothing in the dicta- 
tion to indicate where a line should begin or 
where end, nor, of course, is there any punc- 
tuation, there being no way by which the marks 
of punctuation could be denoted. There is 
usually, however, a perceptible pause at the 
end of a sentence. The words are taken down 
as they are spelled on the board, without any 
attempt, at the time, at versification or punc- 
tuation. After the sitting, the matter is punc- 
tuated and lined as nearly in accord with the 
principles of blank verse construction as the 
abilities of the editor will permit. It is not 
claimed that the line arrangement of the verses 
as they are here presented is perfect ; but that 
is a detail of minor importance, and for what- 
ever technical imperfections there may be in 
this particular, Patience Worth is not re- 
sponsible. The important thing is that every 
word is given exactly as it came from the 



66 PATIENCE WORTH 

board, without the alteration of a syllable, and 
without changing the position or even the spell- 
ing of a single one. 

As a rule, Patience spells the words in ac- 
cordance with the standards of today, but there 
are frequent departures from those standards, 
and many times she has spelled a word two or 
three different ways in the same composition. 
For example, she will spell " spin " with one 
n or two n's indifferently: she will spell 
" friend " correctly, and a little later will add 
an e to it; she will write "boughs" aiid 
" bows " in the same composition. On the 
other hand she invariably spells tongue 
" tung," and positively refuses to change it, 
and this is true also of the word bosom, which 
she spells " busom." 

There are indications that the poems and the 
stories are in course of composition at the time 
they are being produced on the ouija board. 
Indeed, one can almost imagine the author dic- 
tating to an amanuensis in the manner that was 
necessary before stenography was invented, 
when every word had to be spelled out in long- 



THE POETRY 67 

hand. At times the little table will move with 
such rapidity that it is very difficult to follow 
its point with the eye and catch the letter indi- 
cated. Then there will be a pause, and the 
pointer will circle around the board, as if the 
composer were trying to decide upon a word 
or a phrase. Occasionally four or five words 
of a sentence will be given, then suddenly the 
planchette will dart up to the word " No,'' and 
begin the sentence again with different and, it 
is to be presumed, more satisfactory words. 

Sometimes, though rarely. Patience will be- 
gin a composition and suddenly abandon it 
with an exclamation of displeasure, or else take 
up a new and entirely different subject. Once 
she began a prose composition thus: 

" I waste my substance on the weaving of 
web and the storing of pebbles. When shall I 
build mine house, and when fill the purse? Oh, 
that my fancy weaved not but web, and desire 
pricketh not but pebble! " 

There was an impatient dash across the 
board, and then she exclaimed: 

*'Bah, 'tis bally reasoning! I plucked a 



68 PATIENCE WORTH 

gosling for a goose, and found down enough 
to pad the parson's saddle skirts ! " 

At another time she began: 

" Rain, art thou the tears wept a thousand 
years agone, and soaked into the granite walls 
of dumb and feelingless races? Now- " 

There was a long pause and then came this 
lullaby: 

Oh, baby, soft upon my breast press thou, 

And let my fluttering throat spell song to thee, 

A song that floweth so, my sleeping dear: 

Oh, buttercups of eve, 

Oh, willyniUy, 

My song shall flutter on, 

Oh, willynilly. 

I climb a web to reach a star, 

And stub my toe against a moonbeam 

Stretched to bar my way. 

Oh, willynilly. 

A love-puff^ vine shall shelter us. 

Oh, baby mine; 

And then across the sky we'll float 

And pufi^ the stars away. 

Oh, willynilly, on we'll go, 

Willynilly floating. 



THE POETRY 69 

" Thee art o'erfed on pudding," she added 
to Mrs. Curran. " This sauce is but a butter- 
whip." 

And now, having briefly referred to the 
technique of the poems, and explained the 
manner in which they are transmitted we will 
make a more systematic presentation of them. 
For a beginning, nothing better could be of- 
fered than the Spinning Wheel lullaby here- 
tofore referred to. 

In it we can see the mother of, perhaps, 
the Puritan days, seated at the spinning wheel 
while she sings to the child which is supposed 
to lie in the cradle by her side. One can view 
through the open door the old-fashioned 
flower garden bathed in sunlight, can hear the 
song of the bird and the hum of the bee, and 
through it all the sound of the wheel. But! — 
it is the song of a childless woman to an 
imaginary babe: Patience has declared herself 
a spinster. 

Strumm, strumm! 
Ah, wee one, 



70 PATIENCE WORTH 

Croon unto the tendrill tipped with sungilt, 
Nodding thee from o'er the doorsill there. 

Strumm, strumm! 

My wheel shall sing to thee. 
I pull the flax as golden as thy curl, 
And sing me of the blossoms blue, 
Their promise, like thine eyes to me. 

Strumm, strumm ! 

'Tis such a merry tale I spinn. 
Ah, wee one, croon unto the honey bee 
Who diggeth at the rose's heart. 

Strumm, strumm! 

My wheel shall sing to thee. 
Heart-blossom mine. The sunny morn 
Doth hum with lovelilt, dear. 
I fain would leave my spinning 
To the spider climbing there, 
And bruise thee, blossom, to my breast. 

Strumm, strumm t 

What fancies I do weave! 
Thy dimpled hand doth flutter, dear, 
Like a petal cast adrift 
Upon the breeze. 



THE POETRY 71 

Strumm, strumm ! 

'Tis faulty spinning, dear. 
A cradle built of thornwood, 
A nest for thee, my bird. 
I hear thy crooning, wee one, 
And ah, this fluttering heart. 

Strumm, strumm! 

How ruthlessly I spinn! 
My wheel doth wirr an empty song, my dear, 
For tendrill nodding ponder 
Doth nod in vain, my sweet ; 
And honey bee would tarry not 
For thee ; and thornwood cradle swayeth 
Only to the loving of the wind! 

Strumm, strumm! 

My wheel still sings to thee, 
Thou birdling of my fancy's realm 1 

Strumm, strumm ! 

An empty dream, my dearl 
The sun doth shine, my bird ; 
Or should he fail, he shineth here 
Within my heart for thee 1 

Strumm, strumm ! 

My wheel still sings to thee. 



72 PATIENCE WORTH 

Who would say that rhyme or measured 
lines would add anything to this unique 
song? It is filled with the images which are the 
essentials of true poetry, and it has the rhythm 
which sets the imagery to music and gives it 
vitality. " The tendrill tipped with sungilt," 
" the sunny morn doth hum with lovelilt," 
" thy dimpled hand doth flutter like a petal 
cast adrift upon the breeze " — these are figures 
that a Shelley would not wish to disown. There 
is a lightness and delicacy, too, that would 
seem to be contrary to our notions of the 
adaptiveness of blank verse. But these are 
technical features. It is the pathos of the 
song, the expression of the mother-yearning 
instinctive in every woman, which gives it 
value to the heart. 

And yet there is a pleasure expressed in 
this song, the pleasure of imagination, which 
makes the mind's pictures living realities. In 
the poem which follows Patience expresses the 
feelings of the dreamer who is rudely 
awakened from this delightful pastime by the 
realist who sees but what his eyes behold : 



THE POETRY 73 

Athin the even's hour, 

When shadow purpleth the garden wall, 

Then sit thee there adream, 

And cunger thee from out the pack o' me. 

Yea, speak thou, and tell to me 

What 'tis thou hearest here. 

A rustling? Yea, aright! 

A murmuring? Yea, aright ! 

Ah, then, thou sayest, 'tis the leaves 

That love one 'pon the other. 

Yea, and the murmuring, thou sayest. 

Is but the streamlet's hum. 

Nay, nay ! For wait thee. 
Ayonder o'er the wall doth rise 
The white faced Sister o' the Sky. 
And lo, she beareth thee a fairies' wand, 
And showeth thee the ghosts o' dreams. 

Look thou! Ah, look! A one 

Doth step adown the path! The rustle.? 

'Tis the silken whisper o' her robe. 

The hum ? The love-note o' her maiden dream. 

See thee, ah, see! She bendeth there. 

And branch o' bloom doth nod and dance. 

Hark, the note! A robin's cheer? 



74 PATIENCE WORTH 

Ah, Brother, nay. 

'Tis the whistle o' her lover's pipe. 

See, see, the path e'en now 

Doth show him, tall and dark, aside the gate. 

What ! What ! Thou sayest 

'Tis but the rustle o' the leaves. 

And brooklet's humming o'er its stony path ! 

Then hush! Yea, hush thee! 

Hush and leave me here! 

The fairy wand hath broke, and leaves 

Stand still, and note hath ceased. 

And maiden vanished with thy word. 

Thou, thou hast broke the spell. 

And dream hath heard thy word and fled. 

Yea, sunk, sunk upon the path, 

They o' my dreams — slain, slain, 

And dead with but thy word. 

Ah, leave me here and go, 

For Earth doth hold not 

E'en my dreaming's wraith. 

In previous chapters I have spoken of the 
wit and humor of Patience Worth. In only 
one instance has she put humor into verse, and 
that I have already quoted; but at times her 



THE POETRY 75 

poetry has an airy playfulness of form that 
gives the effect of humor, even though the 
theme and the intent may be serious. Here is 
an example: 

Whiff, sayeth the wind, 
And whiffing on its way, doth blow a merry tale. 
Where, in the fields all furrowed and rough with corn, 
Late harvested, close-nestled to a fibrous root. 
And warmed by the sun that hid from night there- 

neath, 
A wee, small, furry nest of root mice lay. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind. 
I found this morrow, on a slender stem, 
A glory of the morn, who sheltered in her wine-red 

throat 
A tiny spinning worm that wove the livelong day, — 
Long after the glory had put her flag to mast — 
And spun the thread I followed to the dell. 
Where, in a gnarled old oak, I found a grub. 
Who waited for the spinner's strand 
To draw him to the light. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind! 
I blew a beggar's rags, and loving 



76 PATIENCE WORTH 

Was the flapping of the cloth. And singing on 
I went to blow a king's mantle 'bout his limbs. 
And cut me on the crusted gilt. 
And tainted did I stain the rose until she turned 
A snuffy brown and rested her poor head 
Upon the rail along the path. 
Whiff, sayeth the wind. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind. 
I blow me 'long the coast. 
And steal from out the waves their roar ; 
And yet from out the riffles do I steal 
The rustle of the leaves, who borrow of the riffle's 

song 
From me at summer-tide. And then 
I pipe unto the sands, who dance and creep 
Before me in the path. I blow the dead 
And lifeless earth to dancing, tingling life. 
And slap thee to awake at mom. 

Whiff, sayeth the wind. 

There is a vivacity in this odd conceit that in 
itself brings a smile, which is likely to broaden 
at the irony in the suggestion of the wind cut- 
ting itself on the crusted gilt of a king's mantle. 
Equally spirited in movement, but vastly dif- 
ferent in character, is the one which follows : 



THE POETRY 77 

Hi-ho, alack-a-day, whither going? 
Art dawdling time away adown the primrose path 
And wishing golden dust to fancied value? 
Ah, catch the milch-dewed air, breathe deep 
The clover-scented breath across the field. 
And feed upon sweet-rooted grasses 
Thou hast idly plucked. 
Come, Brother, then let's on together. 

Hi-ho, alack-a-day, whither going? 
Is here thy path adown the hard-flagged pave. 
Where, bowed, the workers blindly shuffle on ; 
And dumbly stand in gullies bound, 
The worn, bedogged, silent-suffering beast, 
Far driven past his due? 

And thou, beloved, hast thy burden worn thee weary ? 
Come, Brother, then let's on together. 

Hi-ho, alack-a-day, whither going? 
Hast thou begun the tottering of age. 
And doth the day seem over-long to thee? 
Art fretting for release, and dost thou lack 
The power to weave anew life's tangled skein? 
Come, Brother, then let's on together. 

The second line of this will at once recall 
Shakespeare's " primrose path of dalliance," 
and it is one of the rare instances in which 



78 PATIENCE WORTH 

Patience may be said to have borrowed a meta- 
phor; but in the line which follows, " and wish- 
ing golden dust to fancied value," she puts the 
figure to better use than he in whom it origi- 
nated. Beyond this line there is nothing spe- 
cially remarkable in this poem, and it is given 
mainly to show the versatility of the com- 
poser, and as another example of her ability to 
present vivid and striking pictures. 

Reference has been made to the love of 
nature and the knowledge of nature betrayed 
in these poems. Even in those of the most 
spiritual character nature is drawn upon for 
illustrations and symbols, and the lines are 
lavishly strewn with material metaphor and 
similes that open up the gates of understand- 
ing. This picture of winter, for example, 
brings out the landscape it describes with the 
vividness and reality of a stereoscope, and yet 
it is something more than a picture : 

Snow tweaketh 'neath thy feet, 
And like a wandering painter stalketh Frost, 
Daubing leaf and lichen. Where flowed a cataract 



THE POETRY 79 

And mist-fogged stream, lies silvered sheen, 
Stark, dead and motionless. I hearken 
But to hear the she-e-e-e of warning wind, 
Fearful lest I waken Nature's sleeping. 
Await ye! Like a falcon loosed 
Cometh the awakening. Then returneth Spring 
To nestle in the curving breast of yonder hill, 
And sets to rest like the falcon seeketh 
His lady's outstretched arm. 

And here is another picture of winter, 
painted with a larger brush and heavier pig- 
ment, but expressing the same thought, that 
life doth ever follow death: 

Dead, all dead ! 
The earth, the fields, lie stretched in sleep 
Like weary toilers overdone. 
The valleys gape like toothless age, 
Besnaggled by dead trees. 

The hills, like boney jaws whose filesh hath dropped, 
Stand grinning at the deathy day. 
The lily, too, hath cast her shroud 
And clothed her as a brown-robed nun. 
The moon doth, at the even's creep. 
Reach forth her whitened hands and sooth 
The wrinkled brow of earth to sleep. 



80 PATIENCE WORTH 

Ah, whither flown the fleecy summer clouds, 

To bank, and fall to earth in billowed light, 

And paint the winter's brown to spangled white? 

Where, too, have flown the happy songs, 

Long died away with sighing 

On the shore-wave's crest? 

Will they take Echo as their Guide, 

And bound from hill to hill at this, 

The sleepy time of earth, 

And waken forest song 'mid naked waste? 

Ah, slumber, slumber, slumber on. 

'Tis with a loving hand He scattereth the snow, 

To nestle young spring's ofi^ering. 

That dying Earth shall live anew. 

How different this from Thomson's pessi- 
mistic. 

Dread winter spreads his latest glooms 

And reigns tremendous o'er the conquered year. 

This poem seemed to present imusual diffi- 
culties to Patience. The words came slowly 
and haltingly, and the indications of composi- 
tion were more marked than in any other of 
her poems. The third line was first dictated 
" Like weary workmen overdone," and then 



T 



THE POETRY 81 

changed to " weary toilers," and the eighteenth 
line was given: " On the shore-wavelet's 
breast," and afterwards altered to read " the 
shorewave's crest." 

Possibly it was because the poet has not the 
same zest in painting pictures of winter that 
she has in depicting scenes of kindlier seasons, 
in which she is in accord with nearly all poets, 
and, for that matter, with nearly all people. 
Her pen, if one may use the word, is speediest 
and surest when she presents the beautiful, 
whether it be the material or the spiritual. She 
expresses this feeling herself with beauty of 
phrase and rhythm in this verse, which may be 
entitled " The Voice of Spring." 

The streamlet under fernbanked brink 

Doth laugh to feel the tickle of the waving mass ; 

And silver-rippled echo soundeth 

Under over-hanging cliif. 

The robin heareth it at mom 

And steals its chatter for his song. 

And oft at quiet-sleeping 

Of the Spring's bright day, 

I wander me to dream along the brooklet's bank, 



82 PATIENCE WORTH 

And hark me to a song of her dead voice. 

That lieth where the snowflakes vanish 

On the molten silver of the brooklet's breast ; 

And watch the stream, 

Who, over-fearful lest she lose the right 

To ripple to the chord of Spring's full harmony, 

Doth harden at her heart 

And catch the song a prisoner to herself; 

To loosen only at the wooing kiss 

Of youthful Winter's sun. 

And fill the barren waste with phantom spring. 

Or, passing on to autumn, consider this 
apostrophe to a fallen leaf : 

Ah, paled and faded leaf of spring agone, 

Whither goest thou? Art speeding 

To another land upon the brooklet's breast? 

Or art thou sailing to the sea, to lodge 

Amid a reef, and, kissed by wind and wave. 

Die of too much love ? 

Thou'lt find a resting place amid the moss, 

And, ah, who knows I The royal gem 

May be thine own love's offering. 

Or wilt thou flutter as a time-yellowed page. 

And mould among thy sisters, ere the sun 

May peep within the pack? 



THE POETRY 83 

Or will the robin nest with thee 

At Spring's awakening? The romping brook 

Will never chide thee, but ever coax thee on. 

And shouldst thou be impaled 

Upon a thorny branch, what then? 

Try not a flight. Thy sisters call thee. 

Could crocus spring from frost. 

And wilt thou let the violet shrink and die.'* 

Nay, speed not, for God hath not 

A mast for thee provided. 

Autumn, too, is the theme of this : 

She-e-e ! She-e-e ! She-e-e-e ! 
The soughing wind doth breathe. 
The white-crest cloud hath drabbed 
At season's late. The trees drip leaf-waste 
Unto the o'erloved blades aneath, 
Who burned o' love, to die. 

'Tis the parting o' the season. 
Yea, and earth doth weep. The mellow moon 
Stands high o'er golded grain. The cot-smoke 
Curleth like to a loving arm 
That reacheth up unto the sky. 
The grain ears ope, to grin unto the day. 
The stream hath laden with a pack o' leaves 



84 PATIENCE WORTH 

To bear unto the dell, where bloom 

Doth hide in waiting for her pack. 

The stars do glitter cold, and dance to warm them 

There upon the sky's blue carpet o'er the earth. 

'Tis season's parting. 
Yea, and earth doth weep. The Winter cometh, 
And he bears her j ewels for the decking 
Of his bride. A glittered crown 
Shall fall 'pon earth, and sparkled drop 
Shall stand like gem that flasheth 
'Pon a nobled brow. Yea, the tears 
Of earth shall freeze and drop 
As pearls, the necklace o' the earth. 
'Tis season's parting. Yea, 
And earth doth weep. 
'Tis Fall. 

She does not confine herself to the Seasons 
in her tributes to the divisions of time. There 
are many poems which have the day for their 
subject, all expressive of delight in every 
aspect of the changing hours. There is a psean 
to the day in this: 

The Morn awoke from off her couch of fleece, 

And cast her youth-dampt breath to sweet the Earth. 



THE POETRY 85 

The birds sent carol up to climb the vasts. 
The sleep-stopped Earth awaked in murmuring. 
The dark-winged Night flew past the Day 
Who trod his gleaming upward way. 
The fields folk musicked at the sun's warm ray. 
Web-strewn, the sod, hung o'er o' rainbow gleam. 
The brook, untiring, ever singeth on. 

The Day hath broke, and busy Earth 

Hath set upon the path o' hours. 

Mute Night hath spread her darksome wing 

And loosed the brood of dreams, 

And Day hath set the downy mites to flight. 

Fling forth thy dreaming hours ! Awake from dark! 

And hark ! And hark ! The Earth doth ring in song ! 

'TisDay! 'TisDay! 'TisDay! 

The close observer will notice in all of these 
poems that there is nothing hackneyed. The 
themes, the thoughts, the images, the phrasing, 
are almost if not altogether unique. The verse 
which follows is, I am inclined to believe, abso- 
lutely so: 

Go to the builder of all dreams 

And beg thy timbers to cast thee one. 



86 PATIENCE WORTH 

Ah, Builder, let me wander in this land 

Of softened shapes to choose. My hand doth reach 

To catch the mantle cast by lilies whom the sun 

Hath loved too well. And at this morrow 

Saw I not a purple wing of night 

To fold itself and bask in morning light? 

I watched her steal straight to the sun's 

Bedazzled heart. I claim her purpled gold. 

And watched I not, at twi-hours creep, 

A heron's blue wing skim across the pond, 

Where gulf clouds fleeted in a fleecy herd. 

Reflected fair? I claim the blue and let 

My heart to gambol with the sky-herd there. 

At midday did I not then find 

A rod of gold, and sun's flowers, 

Bounded in by wheat's betasseled stalks? 

I claim the gold as mine, to cast my dream. 

And then at stormtide did I catch the sun, 

Becrimsoned in his anger; and from his height 

Did he not bathe the treetops in his gore? 

The red is mine. I weave my dream and find 

The rainbow, and the rainbow's end — a nothingness. 

Almost equally weird is this " Birth of a 
Song " : 

I builded me a harp. 

And set asearch for strings. 



THE POETRY 87 

Ah, and Folly set me 'pon a track 
That set the music at a wail; 
For I did string the harp 
With silvered moon-threads ; 
Aye, and dead the notes did sound. 
And I did string it then 
With golden sun's-threads. 
And Passion killed the song. 

Then did I to string it o'er — 
And 'twer a jeweled string — 
A chain o' stars, and lo. 
They laughed, and sorry wert the song. 
And I did strip the harp and cast 
The stars to merry o'er the Night ; 
And string anew, and set athrob a string 
Abuilded of a lover's note, and lo, 
The song did sick and die. 
And crumbled to a sweeted dust, 
And blew unto the day. 

Anew did I to string, 
Astring with wail o' babe. 
And Earth loved not the song. 
I felled asorrowed at the task. 
And still the Harp wert mute. 
So did I to pluck out my heart. 
And lo, it throbbed and sung. 



88 PATIENCE WORTH 

And at the hurt o' loosing o' the heart 
A song wert born. 

That, however, is but a pretty play of fancy 
upon things within our ken, however shadowy 
and evanescent she may make them by her 
touch. But in the poem which follows she 
touches on the border of a land we know not : 

I'd greet thee, loves of jester's day. 

I'd call thee out from There. 

I'd sup the joys of yonder realm. 

I'd list unto the songs of them 

Who days of me know not. 

I'd call unto this hour 

The lost of joys and woes. 

I'd seek me out the sorries 

That traced the seaming of thy cheek, 

O thou of yester's day [ 

* I'd read the hearts astopped, 
That Earth might know the price 
They paid as toll. 

I'd love their loves, I'd hate their hates, 
I'd sup the cups of them ; 
Yea, I'd bathe me in the sweetness 
Shed by youth of yester's day. 



THE POETRY 89 

Yea, of these I'd weave the Earth a cloak — 

But ah, He wove afirst ! 

They cling like petal mold, and sweet the Earth. 

Yea, the Earth lies wrapped 

Within the holy of its ghost. 

*' 'Tis but a drip o' loving," she said when 
she had finished this. 

Nearly every English poet has a tribute to 
the Skylark, but I doubt if there are many 
more exquisite than this : 

I tuned my song to love and hate and pain 

And scorn, and wrung from passion's heat the flame, 

And found the song a wailing waste of voice. 

My song but reached the earth and echoed o'er its 

plains. 
I sought for one who sang a wordless lay. 
And up from 'mong the rushes soared a lark. 
Hark to his song! 

From sunlight came his gladdening note. 
And ah, his trill — the raindrops' patter! 

And think ye that the thief would steal 

The rustle of the leaves, or yet 

The chilling chatter of the brooklet's song? 

Not claiming as his own the carol of my heart, 



90 PATIENCE WORTH 

Or listening to my plaint, he sings amid the clouds ; 
And through the downward cadence I but hear 
The murmurings of the day. 

One naturally thinks of Shelley's " Sky- 
lark " when reading this, and there are some 
passages in that celebrated poem that show a 
similarity of metaphor, such as this: 



)( 



Sounds of vernal showers 
On the twinkling grass; 
Rain-awakened flowers ; 
All that ever was 
Joyous and clear and fresh 
Thy music doth surpass. 



And there is something of the same thought 
in the lines of Edmund Burke : 

Teach me, O lark ! with thee to greatly rise, 
T' exalt my soul and lift it to^ the skies; 
To make each worldly joy as mean appear, 
Unworthy care when heavenly joys are near. 

But Patience nowhere belittles earthly joys 
that are not evil in themselves; nor does she 



THE POETRY 91 

teach that all earthly passions are inherently, 
wrong: for earthly love is the theme of many 
of her verses. 

Her expressions of scorn are sometimes 
powerful in their vehemence. This, on " War," 
for example: 

Ah, thinkest thou to trick? 
I fain would peep beneath the visor. 
A god of war, indeed I Thou liest I 
A masquerading fiend. 
The harlot of the universe — 
War, whose lips, becrimsoned in her lover's blood, 
Smile only to his death-damped eyes * 
I challenge thee to throw thy coat of mail ! 
Ah, God! Look thou beneath! 
Behold, those arms outstretched I 
That raiment over-spangled with a leaden rain! 
O, Lover, trust her not! 
She biddeth thee in siren song, 
And clotheth in a silken rag her treachery, 
To mock thee and to wreak 
Her vengeance at thy hearth. 
Cast up the visor's skirt! 
Thou'lt see the snakey strands. 
A god of war, indeed! I brand ye as a lie! 



92 PATIENCE WORTH 

Such outbreaks as this are rare in her 
poetry, but in her conversation she occasionally 
gives expression to anger or scorn or con- 
tempt, though, as stated, she seldom dignifies 
such emotions in verse. Love, as I have said, 
is her favorite theme in numbers, the love of 
God first and far foremost, and after that 
brother love and mother love. To the love of 
man for woman, or woman for man, there is 
seldom a reference in her poems, although it 
is the theme of some of her dramatic works. 
There is an exquisite expression of mother 
love in the spinning wheel lullaby already 
given, but for rapturous glorification of in- 
fancy, it would be difficult to surpass this, 
which does not reveal its purport until the last 
line: 

Ah, greet the day, which, like a golden butterfly, 

Hovereth 'twixt the night and mom ; 

And welcome her fullness — the hours 

'Mid shadow and those the rose shall grace. 

Hast thou among her hours thy heart's 

Desire and dearest? Name thou then of all 

His beauteous gifts thy greatest treasure. 



THE POETRY 93 

The morning, cool and damp, dark-shadowed 

By the frowning sun — is this thy chosen? 

The midday, flaming as a sword. 

Deep-stained by noon's becrimsoned lights — 

Is this thy chosen? Or misty startide, 

Woven like a spinner's web and jeweled 

By the climbing moon — is this thy chosen? 

Doth forest shade, or shimmering stream. 

Or wild bird song, or cooing of the nesting dove, 

Bespeak thy chosen? He who sendeth light 

Sendeth all to thee, pledges of a bonded love. 

And ye who know Him not, look ye ! 

From all His gifts He pilfered that which made it 

His 
To add His fullest offering of love. 
From out the morning, at the earliest tide, 
He plucked two lingering stars, who tarried 
Lest the dark should sorrow. And when the day was 

bom. 
The glow of sun-flush, veiled by gossamer cloud 
And tinted soft by lingering night ; 
And rose petals, scattered by a loving breeze ; 
The lily's satin cheek, and dove cooes, 
And wild bird song, and Death himself 
Is called to offer of himself; 
And soft as willow buds may be, 



94« PATIENCE WORTH 

He claimeth but the down to fashion this, thy gift, 
The essence of His love, thine own first-bom. 

In brief, the babe concentrates within itself 
all the beauties and all the wonders of nature. 
Its eyes, " two lingering stars who tarried lest 
the dark should sorrow," and in its face " the 
glow of sun flush veiled by gossamer cloud," 
"rose petals" and the "lily's satin cheek"; 
its voice the dove's coo. " From all His gifts 
He pilfered that which made it His " — the 
divine essence — " to add His fullest offering 
of love." This is the idealism of true poetry, 
and what mother looking at her own firstborn 
will say that it is overdrawn? 

So much for mother-love. Of her lines on 
brotherhood I have already given example. 
In only a few verses, as I have said, does Pa- 
tience speak of love between man and woman. 
The poem which follows is perhaps the most 
eloquent of these : 

'Tis mine, this gift, ah, mine alone. 
To paint the leaden sky to lilac-rose. 
Or coax the sullen sun to flash. 
Or carve from granite gray a flaming knight. 



THE POETRY 95 

Or weave the twilight hours with garlands gay, 

Or wake the morning with my soul's glad song, 

Or at my bitterest drink a sweetness cast. 

Or gather from my loneliness the flower — 

A dream amid a mist of tears. 

Ah, treasure mine, this do I pledge to thee. 

That none may peer within thy land ; and only 

When the moon shines white shall I disclose thee ; 

Lest, straying, thou should'st fade; and in the 

blackness 
Of the midnight shall I fondle thee. 
Afraid to show thee to the day. 
When I shall give to Him, the giver, 
All my treasure's stores, and darkness creeps upon me. 
Then will I for this return a thank. 
And show thee to the world. 
Blind are they to thee, but ah, the darkness 
Is illumined ; and lo ! thy name is burned 
Like flaming torch to light me on my way. 
Then from thy wrapping of love I pluck 
My dearest gift, the memory of my dearest love. 
Ah, memory, thou painter. 
Who from cloud canst fashion her dear form, 
Or from a stone canst turn her smile. 
Or fill my loneliness with her dear voice, 
Or weave a loving garland for her hair — 
Thou art my gift of God, to be my comrade here. 



ii 

96 PATIENCE WORTH 

Next to such love as this comes friendship, l 

and she has put an estimate of the value of a 
friend in these words: 

Of Earth there be this store of joys and woes. 

Yea, and they do make the days o' me. 

I sit me here adream that did I hold 

From out the whole, but one, my dearest gift, 

What then would it to be? Doth days and nights 

Of bright and dark make this my store? 

Nay. Do happy hours and woes-tide, then, A 

Beset this day of me and make the thing I'd kepp? 

Nay. Doth metal store and jewelled string 

Then be aworth to me? Nay. I set me here, 

And dreaming, fall to reasoning for this, 

That I would keep, if but one gift wert mine 

Must hold the store o' all. Yea, must hold 

The dark for light, 3'ea, and hold the light for dark, 

Aye, and hold the sweet for sours, aye, and hold 

The love for Hate. Yea, then, where may I to turn? 

And lo, as I adreaming sat 

A voice spaked out to me : What ho ! What ho ! 

And lo, the voice of one, a friend ! 

This, then, shall be my treasure, 
And the Earth part I shall hold 
From out aU gifts of Him. 



THE POETRY 97 

Love of God, and God's love for us, and the 
certainty of life after death as a consequence 
of that love, are the themes of Patience's finest 
poetry, consideration of which is reserved for 
succeeding chapters. Yet a taste of this de- 
votional poetry will not be amiss at this point 
in the presentation of her works, as an indica- 
tion of the character of that which is to come. 

Lo, 'pon a day there bloomed a bud, 

And swayed it at adance 'pon sweeted airs. 

And gardens oped their greened breast 

To shew to Earth o' such an one. 

And soft the morn did woo its bloom ; 

And nights wept 'pon its cheek, 

And mosses crept them 'bout the stem, 

That sun not scoarch where it had sprung. 

And lo, the garden sprite, a maid, 
Who came aseek at every day. 
And kissed the bud, and cast o' drops 
To cool the warm sun's rays. 
And bud did hang it swaying there. 
And love lept from the maiden's breast. 

And days wore on ; and nights did wrap 
The bud to wait the mom; 
And maid aseeked the spot. 



98 PATIENCE WORTH 

When, lo, there came a Stranger 
To the garden's wall, 
Who knocked Him there 
And bid the maiden come. 



And up unto her heart she pressed her hand, 

And reached it forth to stay the bud's soft sway, 

And lo, the sun hung dark. 

And Stranger knocked Him there. 

And 'twere the maid did step most regal to the place. 

And harked, and lo, His voice aspoke. 

And she looked upon His face. 

And lo, 'twere sorry sore, and sad! 

And soft there came His word 

Of pleading unto her : 

" O' thy garden's store do offer unto me." 

And lo, the maid did turn and seek her out the bud, 

And pluck it that she bear it unto Him. 

And at the garden's ope He stood and waited her. 

And forth her hand she held, therein the bud. 

And lo. He took therefrom the bloom 

And left the garden bare. 

And maid did stand astripped 

Of heart's sun 'mid her garden's bloom. 

When lo, athin the wound there sunk 

A warmpth that filled it up with love. 

Yea, 'twere the smile o' Him, the price. 



THE POETRY 99 

But she has given another form of poem 
which should be presented before this brief re- 
view of her more material verse is concluded, 
and it is a form one would hardly expect from 
such a source. I refer to the *' poem of occa- 
sion." A few days before Christmas, Mrs. 
Curran remarked as she sat at the board: " I 
wonder if Patience wouldn't give us a Christ- 
mas poem." And without a moment's hesita- 
tion she did. Here it is: 

I hied me to the glen and dell, 

And o'er the heights, afar and near. 

To find the Yule sprite's haunt. 

I dreamt me it did bide 

Where mistletoe doth bead; 

And found an oak whose boughs 

Hung clustered with its borrowed loveliness. 

Ah, could such a one as she 

Abide her in this chill? 

For bleakness wraps the oak about 

And crackles o'er her dancing branch. 

Nay, her very warmth 

Would surely thaw away the icy shroud, 

And mistletoe would die 

Adreaming it was spring. 



100 PATIENCE WORTH 

I hied me to the holly tree 

And made me sure to find her there. 

But nay, 

The thorny spines would prick her tenderness. 

Ah, where then doth she bide? 

I asked the frost who stood 

Upon the fringed grasses 'neath the oak. 

" I know her not, but I 

Am ever bidden to her feast. 

Ask thou the sparrow of the field. 

He searcheth everywhere; perchance 

He knoweth where she bides." 

" Nay, J. know her not, 
But at her birthday's tide 
I find full many a crumb 
Cast wide upon the snow." 

I found a chubby babe, 
Who toddled o'er the ice, and whispered. 
Did she know the Yule sprite's haunt? 
And she but turneth solemn eyes to me 
And wags her golden head. 

I flitted me from house to shack. 
And ever missed the rogue ; 



THE POETRY 101 

But surely she had left her sign 

To bid me on to search. 

And I did weary of my task 

And put my hopes to rest, 

And slept me on the eve afore her birth, 

Full sure to search anew at mom. 

And then the morning broke; 

And e'er mine eyes did ope, 

I fancied me a scarlet sprite, 

With wings of green and scepter of a mistletoe. 

Did bid me wake, and whispered me 

To look me to my heart. 

Soft-nestled, warm, I found her resting there. 

Guard me lest I tell ; 

But, heart o'erfull of loving, 

Thee'lt surely spill good cheer! 

The following week, without request, she 
gave this New Year's poem, remarkable for 
the novelty of its treatment of a much worn 
theme; 

The year hath sickened ; 
And dawning day doth show his withering; 
And Death hath crept him closer on each hour. 
The crying hemlock shaketh in its grief. 



102 PATIENCE WORTH 

The smiling spring hath hollowed it to age, 

And golden grain-stalks fallen 

O'er the naked breast of earth. 

The year's own golden locks 

Have fallen, too, or whitened, 

Where they still do hold. 

And do I sorrow me ? 
Nay, I do speed him on, 
For precious pack he beareth 
To the land of passing dreams. 

I've bundled pain and wishing 
'Round with deeds undone. 
And packed the loving o' my heart 
With softness of thine own ; 
And plied his pack anew 
With loss and gain, to add 
The cup of bitter tears I shed 
O'er nothings as I passed. 

Old year and older years — 

My friends, my comrades on the road below- 

I fain would greet ye now, 

And bid ye Godspeed on your ways. 

I watch ye pass, and read 
The aged visages of each. 



THE POETRY 103 

I love ye well, and count ye o'er 
In fearing lest I lose e'en one of you. 
And here the brother of you, every one, 
Lies smitten! 

But as dear I'll love him 
When the winter's moon doth sink ; 
And like the watery eye of age 
Doth close at ending of his day. 
And I shall flit me through his dreams 
And cheer him with my loving ; 
And last within the pack shall put 
A Hope and speed him thence. 

And bow me to the New. 

A friend mayhap, but still untried. 

And true, ye say .J' 

But ne'er hath proven so! 

Old year, I love thee well. 

And bid thee farewell with a sigh. 

One who reads these poems with thoughtful- 
ness must be impressed by a number of attri- 
butes which make them notable, and, in some 
respects, wholly unique. First of all is the 
absence of conventionality, coupled with skill 



104. PATIENCE WORTH 

in construction, in phrasing, in the compound- 
ing of words, in the appKcation to old words of 
new or unusual but always logical meanings, in 
the maintenance of rhythm without monotony. 
Next is the absolute purity, with the sometimes 
archaic quality, of the English. It is the 
language of Shakespeare, of Marlowe, of 
Fletcher, of Jonson and Drayton, except that 
it presents Saxon words or Saxon prefixes 
which had already passed out of literary use in 
their time, while on the other hand it avoids 
nearly all the words derived directly from 
other languages that were habitually used by 
those great writers. There is rarely a word 
that is not of Anglo-Saxon or Norman birth. 
Nor are there any long words. All of these 
compositions are in words of one, two and 
three syllables, very seldom one of four — ^no 
" multitudinous seas incarnadine." Among 
the hundreds of words of Patience Worth's in 
this chapter there are only two of four syllables 
and less than fifty of three syllables. Fully 
95 per cent of her works are in words of one 
and two syllables. In what other writing, an- 



THE POETRY 105 

cient or modern, the Bible excepted, can this 
simplicity be found? 

But the most impressive attribute of these 
poems is the weirdness of them, an intangible 
quality that defies definition or location, but 
which envelops and permeates all of them. 
One may look in vain through the works of the 
poets for anything with which to compare 
them. They are alike in the essential features 
of all poetry, and yet they are unalike. There 
is something in them that is not in other 
poetry. In the profusion of their metaphor 
there is an etherealness that more closely re- 
sembles Shelley, perhaps, than any other poet ; 
but the beauty of Shelley's poems is almost 
wholly in their diction : there is in him no pro- 
fundity of thought. In these poems there is 
both beauty and depth — and something else. 



THE PROSE 

" Word meeteth word, and at touch o' me, doth 
spell to thee." — Patience Worth. 

Strictly speaking, there is no prose in the 
compositions of Patience Worth. That which 
I have here classified as prose, lacks none of 
the essential elements of poetry, except a con- 
tinuity of rhythm. The rhythm is there, the 
iambic measure which she favors being fairly 
constant, but it is broken by sentences and 
groups of sentences that are not metrical, and 
while it would not be difficult to arrange most 
of this matter in verse form, I am inclined to 
think that to the majority it will read smoother 
and with greater ease as prose. Nevertheless, 
as will be seen, it is poetry. The diction is 
wholly of that order, and it is filled with strik- 
ingly vivid and agreeable imagery. There is, 
however, this distinction: most of the matter 

107 



108 PATIENCE WORTH 

here classed as prose is dramatic in form and 
treatment, and each composition tells a story 
— a story with a definite and well-constructed 
plot, dealing with real and strongly individ- 
ualized people, and mingling humor and 
pathos with much effectiveness. They bring at 
once a smile to the face and a tear to the eye. 
They differ, too, from the poetry, in that they 
have little or no apparent spiritual signifi- 
cance. They are stories, beautiful stories, un- 
like anything to be found in the literature of 
any country or any time, but, except in the 
shadowy figure of " The Stranger," they do 
not rise above the things of earth. That is not 
to say, however, that they are not spiritual in 
the intellectual or emotional sense of the word, 
as distinguished from the soul relation. 

At the end of an evening a year and a half 
after Patience began her work, she said: " Thy 
hearth is bright. I fain would knit beside its 
glow and spinn a wordy tale betimes." 

At the next sitting she began the " wordy 
tale." Up to that time she had offered noth- 
ing in prose form but short didactic pieces. 



THE PROSE 109 

such as will appear in subsequent chapters of 
this book, and the circle was lost in astonish- 
ment at the unfolding of this story, so different 
in form and spirit from anything she had pre- 
viously given. 

Her stories are, as already stated, dramatic 
in form. Indeed they are condensed dramas. 
After a brief descriptive introduction or pro- 
logue, all the rest is dialogue, and the scenes 
are shifted without explanatory connection, as 
in a play. In the story of " The Fool and the 
Lady " which follows, the fool bids adieu to the 
porter of the inn, and in the next line begins a 
conversation with Lisa, whom he meets, as the 
context shows, at some point on the road to the 
tourney. It is the change from the first to 
the second act or scene, but no stage directions 
came from the board, no marks of division or 
change of scene, nor names of persons speak- 
ing, except as indicated in the context. In re- 
producing these stories, no attempt has been 
made to put them completely in the dramatic 
form for which they were evidently designed, 
the desire being to present them as nearly as^ 



110 PATIENCE WORTH 

possible as they were received; but to maKe 
them clearer to the reader the characters are 
identified, and shift of scene or time has been 
indicated. 



THE FOOL AND THE LADY 

And there it lay, asleep. A mantle, gray as 
monk's cloth, its covering. Dim-glowing 
tapers shine like glowflies down the narrow 
winding streets. The sounds of early morn- 
ing creep through the thickened veil of heavy 
mist, like echoes of the day afore. The wind is 
toying with the threading smoke, and still it 
clingeth to the chimney pot. 

There stands, beyond the darkest shadow, 
the Inn of Falcon Feather, her sides becracked 
with sounding of the laughter of the king and 
gentlefolk, who barter song and story for the 
price of ale. Her windows sleep like heavy- 
lidded eyes, and her breath doth reek with 
wine, last drunk by a merry party there. 

The lamp, now blacked and dead, could 

boast to ye of part to many an undoing of the 

unwary. The roof, o'er-hanging and be- 

peaked, doth 'mind ye of a sleeper in his cap. 

Ill 



112 PATIENCE WORTH 

The mist now rises like a curtain, and over 
yonder steeple peeps the sun, his face washed 
fresh in the basin of the night. His beams now 
light the dark beneath the palsied stair, and rag 
and straw doth heave to belch forth its bag- 
gage for the night. 



{Fool) "Eh, gad! 'Tis morn, Beppo. 
Come, up, ye vermin ; laugh and prove thou art 
the fooFs. An ape and jackass are wearers of 
the cap and bells. Thou wert fashioned with 
a tail to wear behind, and I to spin a tale to 
leave but not to wear. For the sayings of the 
fool are purchased by the wise. My crooked 
back and pegs are purses — the price to buy my 
gown; but better far, Beppo, to hunch and yet 
to peer into the clouds, than be as strong as 
knights are wont to be, and belly, like a snake, 
amongst the day's bright hours. 

" Here, eat thy crust. 'Tis funny-bread, the 
earnings of a fool. 

" I looked at Lisa as she rode her mount at 
yesternoon, and saw her skirt the road with 
anxious eyes. Dost know for whom she 



THE PROSE 113 

sought, Beppo? Not me, who, breathless, 
watched behind a flowering bush to hide my 
ughness. Now laugh, Beppo, and prove thou 
art the fool's! 

" But 'neath these stripes of color I did feel 
new strength, and saw me strided on a black 
beside her there. And, Beppo, knave, thou 
didst but rattle at thy chain, and lo, the shrink- 
ing of my dream! 

" But we do limp quite merrily, and could 
we sing our song in truer measure — thou the 
mimic, and I the fool? Thine eyes hold more 
for me than all the world, since hers do see me 
not. 

" We two together shall flatten 'neath the 
tree in yonder field and ride the clouds, Beppo, 
I promise ye, at after hour of noon. 

"See! Tonio has slid the shutter's bolt! 
I'll spin a song and bart him for a sup." 

(Tonio) " So, baggage, thou hast slept 
aneath the smell thou lovest best! " 

(Fool) " Oh, morrow, Tonio. The smell 
is weak as yester's unsealed wine. My tank 



114. PATIENCE WORTH 

doth tickle with the dust of rust, and yet me- 
thinks thou would'st see my slattern stays to 
rattle like dry bones, to please thee. See, 
Beppo cryeth! Fetch me then a cup that I 
may catch the drops — or, here, I'll milk the 
dragon o'er thy door!" 

{Tonio) "Thou scrapple! Come within. 
'Tis he who loveth not the fool who doth hate 
his God." 

(Fool) "I'm loth to leave my chosen com- 
pany. Come, Beppo, his words are hard, but 
we do know his heart. 

" A health to thee, Antonio. Put in thy 
wine one taste of thy heart's brew and I need 
not wish ye well. 

" To her, Beppo. Come, dip and take a lick. 

" Tonio, hast heard that at a time not set 
as yet the tournament will be? Who think 
ye rides the King's lance and weareth Lisa's 
colors? Blue, Tonio, and ggld, the heavens' 
garb — stop, Beppo, thou meddling pest! 
Antonio, I swear those bits of cloth are but 
patches I have pilfered from the ragheap 
adown the alleyway. I knew not they were 



THE PROSE 115 

blue. And this is but a tassel dropt from off 
a lance at yester's ride. I knew not of its 
tinselled glint, I swear! 

" So, thou dost laugh? Ah, Beppo, see, he 
laughs! And we too, eh? But do we laugh 
the same? Come, jump! Thy pulpit is my 
hump. Aday, Antonio ! " 

(Antonio) " Aday, thou fool, and would I 
had the wisdom of thy ape." 

(On the Road to the Tournament.) 

(Lisa) "Aday, fool!" 

(Fool) " Ah, lady fair, hath lost the silver 
of thy laugh, and dost thee wish me then to 
fetch it thee?" 

(Lisa) " Yea, jester. Thou speaketh wise- 
ly; for may I ripple laughter from a sorry 
heart? Now tease me, then." 

(Fool) " A crooked laugh would be thy 
gift should I tease it with a crooked tale ; and, 
lady, didst thee e'er behold a crooked laugh — 
one which holds within its crook a tear? " 

(Lisa) " Oh, thou art in truth a fool. I'd 
bend the crook and strike the tear away." 



116 PATIENCE WORTH 

(Fool) " Aye, lady, so thou wouldst. But 
thou hast ne'er yet found thy lot to bear a 
crook held staunch within His hand! Spring 
rain would be thy tears — a balm to buy fresh 
beauties. And the fool? Ah, his do dry in 
dust, e'en before they fall! " 

(Lisa) " Pish, jester, thy tears would paint 
thy face to crooked lines, and thee wouldst 
laugh to see the muck. My heart doth truly 
sorry. Hast heard the King hath promised me 
as wages for the joust? And thee dost know 
who rideth 'gainst my chosen? " 

(Fool) " Aye, lady, the crones do wag, and 
I do promise ye they wear their necks be- 
cricked to see his palfrey pass. They do tell 
me that his sumpter-cloth doth trail like a 
ladies' robe." 

(Lisa) " Yea, fool, and pledge me thy 
heart to tell it not, I did broider at its hem a 
thrush with mine own tress — a song to cheer 
his way, a wing to speed him on." 

(Fool) " Hear, Beppo, how she prates! 
Would I were a posey wreath and Beppo here 



THE PROSE 117 

a fashioner of song. We then would lend us to 
thy hand to offer as a token. But thou dost 
know a fool and ape are ever but a fool and 
ape. I'm off to chase thy truant laugh. Who 
Cometh there? The dust doth rise like storm- 
cloud along the road ahead, and 'tis shot with 
glinting. Oh, I see the mantling flush of 
morning put to shame by the flushing of thy 
cheek! See, he doth ride with helmet ope. Its 
golden bars do clatter at the jolt, and — but 
stop, Beppo, she heareth not! We, poor beg- 
gars, thee and me — an ape with a tail and a 
fool with a heart! 

" See, Beppo, I did tear a rose to tatters but 
to fling its petals 'neath her feet. They tell me 
that his lance doth bear a ribband blue and a 
curling lock of gold — and yet he treads the 
earth! Let's then away! 

The world may sorrow 

But the fool must laugh. 

'Tis blessed grain 

That hath no chaff. 

To love an ape 

Is but to ape at love, 



118 PATIENCE WORTH 

I sought a hand. 

And found — a glove 1 



" Beppo, laugh, and prove thyself the fool's! 
I fain would feel the yoke, lest I step too high. 

" Come, we'll seek the shelt'ring tree. I've 
in my kit a bit of curd. Thy conscience need 
not prick. I swear that Tonio, the rogue, did 
see me stow it there! 

"Ah, me, 'tis such a home for fools, the 
earth. And they that are not fools are apes. 

" I see the crowd bestringing 'long the road, 
and yonder clarion doth bid the riders come. 
Well, Beppo, do we ride? Come, chere, we 
may tramp our crooked path and ride astraddle 
of a cloud. 

" She doth love him, then; and even now the 
horn doth sound anew — and she the prize ! 

" I call the God above to see the joke that 
fate hath played; for I do swear, Beppo, that 
when he rides he carries on his lance-point this 
heart. 

" I fret me here, but dare I see the play? 
Yea, 'tis a poor fool that loveth not his jest. 



THE PROSE 119 

" I go, Beppo; I know not why, save I do 
love her so. 

" I'll bear my hunch like a badge of His 
colors and I shall laugh, Beppo, shall laugh at 
losing. He loves me well, else why didst send 
me thee? 

" The way seems over long. 

" They parry at the ring! I see her veil to 
float like cloud upon the breeze. 

" She sees me not. I wonder that she hear- 
eth not the thumping of my heart. My eyes do 
mist. Beppo, look thou! Ah, God, to see 
within her eyes the look of thine ! 

" They rank ! And hell would cool my brow, 
I swear. Beppo, as thou lovest me, press 
sorely on my hump! Her face, Beppo, it 
swayeth everywhere, as a garden thick with 
bloom — a lily, white and glistening with a rain 
of tears. My heart hath torn asunder, that I 
know. 

" The red knight now doth cast! O Heaven 
turn his lance ! 

"'Tis put! 

"And now the blue and gold! Wait, 



120 PATIENCE WORTH 

brother ape! Hold, in the name of God! 
Straight ! 'Tis tie ! Can I but stand ? 

" I — ah, lady, he doth ride full well. May I 
but steady thee? My legs are wobbled but — 
my hand, dear lady, lest ye sink. 

(" Beppo, 'tis true she seeth me!) 

" Thy hand is cold. I wager you he wins. 
He puts a right too high. Thy thrush is sing- 
ing; hear ye not his song? His wing doth flut- 
ter even now. Ah, he is fitting thee 

" I do but laugh to feel the tickle of a feath- 
ering jest. An age before he puts! A miss! 
A tie ! Ah, lady, should'st thee win I'll laugh 
anew and even then will laugh at what thee 
knowest not. 

" The red knight ! God weight his charger's 
hoof! (My God, Beppo, she did kiss my 
hand!) 

"He's off! Beppo, cling!" 

(Lisa) " The fool! Look ye, the fool and 
ape! Oh heaven stop their flight! He's well 
upon them! Blind me, lest I die! He's 
charged anew, but missed! What, did his 
mantle fall? That shape that lieth! Come! " 



THE PROSE in 

(Lisa, to her knight) " So, thou, beloved, 
didst win me right! Where go they with the 
litter?" 

(Knight) " The fool, my lady, and a chat- 
tering ape, did tempt to jest a charger in the 
field. We found them so. He lives but 
barely." 

{Enter Fool upon litter,) 

(Fool) " Aday, my lady fair! And hast 
thee lost the silver of thy laugh and bid me 
fetch it thee? The world doth hold but fools 
and lovers, folly sick." 

(Lisa) " His eye grows misty. Fool, I 
know thee as a knave and love thee as a man." 

(Fool) " 'Tis but a patch, Beppo, a patch 
and tassel from a lance . . . but we did ride, 
eh? Laugh, Beppo, and prove thou art the 
fool's! I laugh anew, lest my friends should 
know me not. Beppo, I dream of new roads, 
but thou art there! And I do faint, but 
she . . . did kiss my hand . . . Aday . . . 
L— a— d— y." 



Very soon after the completion of this story 
Patience began another one, a Christmas story, 
a weird, mystical tale of medieval England, 
having for its central theme a " Stranger " who 
is visible only to Lady Marye of the Castle. 
The stranger is not described, nor does he 
speak a word, but he is presumedly the Christ. 
There are descriptions of the preparations for 
the Christmas feast at this lordly stronghold 
of baronial days, and the coarse wit of the 
castle servants and the drunken profanity of 
their master, " John the Peaceful," form a 
vivid contrast to the ethereal Lady Marye and 
the simple love of the herder's family at the 
foot of the hill. There are striking characters 
and many beautiful lines in this story, but it is 
not as closely woven nor as coherent in plot as 
the story of the fool and the lady. 



123 



THE STRANGER 

'TwAs at white season o' the year, the 
shrouding o' spring and summerstide. 

Steep, rugged, was the path, and running 
higher on ahead to turret-topped and gated 
castle o' the lordly state o' John the Peaceful, 
where Lady Marye whiled away the dragging 
day at fingering the regal.* 

From sheltered niche she looked adown the 
hillside stretching 'neath; The valley was be- 
stir, A shepherd chided with gentle word his 
flock, and gentle folk did speak o' coming 
Christ-time. Timon, the herder's hut, already 
hung with bitter sweets, and holly and fir 
boughs set to spice the air. 

*' Timon, man, look ye to the wee lambs well, 
for winter promiseth a searching night." 

* Regal. A small portable pipe organ used in the sixteenth and 
seventeenth centuries. It was played with one band while the 
bellows was worked with the other. 

133 



lU PATIENCE WORTH 

Thus spake Leta, who stands, her babe 
astride her hip. 

" And come ye then within. I have a brew 
that of a truth shall tickle at thy funny bone. 
Bring then a bundle o' brush weed that we 
may ply the fire. I vow me thy boots are snow 
carts, verily! 

" Hast seen the castle folk? And fetched ye 
them the kids? They breathe it here that the 
boar they roast would shame a heiffer. All of 
the sparing hours today our Leta did sniff her 
up the hill; nay, since the dawning she hath 
spread her smock and smirked. 

"Leta, thou art such a joy! Thou canst 
wish the winter-painted bough to bloom, and 
like the plum flowers falls the snow. Fetch 
thee a bowl and put the bench to table-side. 
Thy sire wouldst sup. Go now and watch 
aside the crib. Perchance thee'lt catch a 
glimpse o' heaven spilled from Tina's dream. 

" Timon, man, tell me now the doings o' the 
day. I do ettle * for a spicey tale." 

(Timon) " Well, be it so then, minx. I did 

* Ettle. In this case, to have a strong desire. 



THE PROSE 125 

fell the kids at sun- wake, and thee'lt find the 
skins aneath the cape I cast in yonder corner 
there. And I did catch a peep aslaunch * at 
mad Lady Marye, who did play the pipes most 
mournfully. They tell me she doth look a 
straining to this cot of ours. And what think 
ye, Leta? She doth only smile when she doth 
see our wee one's curls to glint. And ever she 
doth speak of him who none hath seen. 'Tis 
strange, think ye not? " 

(Leta) " Nay, Timon, I full oft do pause 
and peer on high to see her at the summertide. 
Like a swan she bendeth, all white, amid her 
garden 'long the lake, and even 'tempts to 
come adown the path to us below. And ever 
at her heels the pea-fowl struts. 

" She ne'er doth see my beckoning, but do 
I come with Tina at my breast she doth smile 
and wave and sway her arms a-cradle-wise. 

" They tell, but breathlessly, that she doth 
sadly say the Stranger bideth here." 

(Timon) " I'll pit my patch 'gainst purse 

* Aslaunch. Aslant or obliquely. As we would now say, "Out 
of the corner of the eye." 



126 PATIENCE WORTH 

o' gold, that * Mad Marye ' fitteth her as surely 
as ' Peaceful John ' doth fit her sire. Thee 
knowest ' peace ' to him is of his cutting, and 
* piece ' doth patch his ripping. 

" They've bid a feast at Christ-night, and ye 
shouldst see the stir! I fain would see Sir 
John at good dark on that eve, besmeared with 
boar grease and soaked with ale, his mouth 
adrip with filth, and every peasant there who 
serves his bolts shall hit. And Lady Marye 
setteth like a lily under frost ! 

" Leta, little one, thine eyes do blink like 
stars beshadowed in a cloudy veil. Come, 
bend thy knee and slip away to dream ! " 

{Little Leta prays) " Vast blue above, 
wherein the angels hide ; and moon, his lamp o' 
love ; and cloud fleece white — art thou the wool 
to swaddle Him? And doth His mother bide 
upon a star-beam that leadeth her to thee? I 
bless Thy name and pray Thee keep my sire to 
watch full well his flock. And put a song in 
every coming day ; my Tina's coo, and mother's 
song at eve. Goodnight, sweet night ! I know 
He watcheth thee and me." 



THE PROSE 127 

(Timon) "He heareth thee, my Leta. 
Watch ye the star on high. See ye, it winketh 
knowingly. God rest ye, blest." 

{At the Castle,) 

■) 
{Lady Marye) "And I the Lady Marye, 

o' the lord's estate! Jana, fetch me a goblet 

that I drink." 

{Jana) " Aye, lady. A wine, perchance? " 

{Lady Marye) " Nay, for y ester thou didst 

fetch me wine, and I did cast it here upon the 

flags. Its stain thee still canst see. Shouldst 

thou fetch a goblet filled to brim with crystal 

drops, and I should cast it here, the greedy 

stone would sup it up, and where be then the 

stain? Think ye the stone then the wiser o' 

the two? 

" I but loosed my fancy from its tether to 

gambol at its will, and they do credit me amiss. 

I weave not with strand upon a wheel. 'Tis 

not my station. Nay, I dally through the day 

with shuttle-cock and regal — a fitting play for 

yonder babe. 



128 PATIENCE WORTH 

" Jana, peer ye to the valley there. Doth 
see the Stranger? He knocketh at the sill o' 
yonder cot. 

" I saw him when the cotter locked the sheep 
to tap a straying ewe who lagged, and he did 
enter as the cotter stepped within — unbidden, 
Jana, that I swear — and now he knocketh 
there!" 

{Jana) " Nay, lady, 'tis but a barish limb 
that reacheth o'er the door. The cotter heed- 
eth not, ye see." 

{Lady Mar ye) " I do see him now to enter, 
and never did he turn! Jana, look ye now! 
Doth still befriend a doubt? " 

{Jana) " Come, lady, look! Sirrah John 
hath sent ye this, a posey, wrought o' gold and 
scented with sweet oils." 

{Lady Marye) " Ah, Jana, 'tis a hateful 
sight to me — a posey I may keep! Why, 
the losing o' the blossom doth but make it 
dear! 

" Stay! I know thee'lt say 'twas proffered 
with his love. But, Jana, thou hast much to 
learn. What, then, is love? Can I then sort 



THE PROSE 129 

my tinder for its building and ply the glass to 
start its flame? The day is o'er full now of 
ones who tried the trade. Nay, Jana, only 
when He toucheth thee and bids thee come and 
putteth to thy hand His own doth love abide 
with thee. 

" Come to the turret, then. I do find me 
whetted for a look within. 

" How cool the eve ! 'Tis creepy to the mar- 
row. Look ye down the hillside there below. 
See ye the cotter's taper burning there ? How 
white the night! 'Tis put upon the earth a 
mantling shroud, and sailing in the silver sky a 
fairy boat. Perchance it bringeth us the 
Babe. 

"Jana, see'st thou the Stranger? He now 
doth count the sheep. Dare I trust him there? 
I see him fondling a lamb and he doth hold it 
close unto his breast." 

{Jana) " Nay, lady, 'tis the shepherd's dog 
who skulketh now ahind the shelter wall." 

{Lady Marye) " Ah, give me, spite o' this, 
the power to sing like Thine own bird who 
swayeth happily upon the forest bough and 



130 PATIENCE WORTH 

pours abroad his song where no man heareth 
him. 

" Hear ye them below within the hall? 
They do lap at swine-broth. Their cups do 
clank. At morrow's eve they feast and now 
do need to stretch their paunches. Full often 
have I seen my ladye mother's white robe 
stained crimson for a jest, and oftener have I 
been gagged to swallow it. But, Jana, I do 
laugh, for the greatest jest is he who walloweth 
in slime and thinketh him a fish." 

{Jana) " See, Lady Marye! This, thy 
mother's oaken chest, it still doth bear a scent 
o' her. And this, thy gown o' her own fash- 
ioning." 

{Lady Marye) " Yea, Jana, and this o' 
her, a strand wound to a ball for mine own cast- 
ing. And this ! I tell thee, 'tis oft and oft she 
did press me to her own breast and chide me 
with her singing voice : * My Marye, 'tis a game 
o' buff, this living o' these days o' ours o' seek- 
ing happiness. When ye would catch the 
rogue he flitteth on.' 



THE PROSE 131 

" See, these spots o' yellowed tears — the 
rusting of her heart away! Stay, Jana, I'll 
teach thee a trick o' tripping, for she full oft 
did say a heart could hide aneath a tripping. 

" Thee shouldst curtsey so ; and spread thy 
fan. 'Tis such a shield to hide ahind. Then 
shouldst thy heart to flutter, trip out its meas- 
ure, so. See, I do laugh me now — nay, 'tis 
ne'er a tear, Jana, 'tis the mist o' loving ! Doth 
see the moon hath joined the dance? Or, am I 
swooning? 'Tis fancy. See, the cotter's taper 
still doth flicker from the shutter. What's 
then amiss? The stranger, Jana! See! He 
entereth the shelter place! Come, I fear me 
lest I see too much? Lend me thy hand. I've 
played the jane-o-apes till the earth doth seem 
awry. 

" Hear ye the wine-soaked song, and aye, 
the f eed-drunkened ? My sire, Jana, my sire! 
I do grow hateful of myself, but mark ye, at 
the setting o' the feast I do wage him war at 
words ! A porridge pot doth brew for babes ; I 
promise ye a full loaf. Do drop the curtain 
now, I weary me with reasoning." 



13a PATIENCE WORTH 

(Morning at the Castle Gate,) 

(Tito) " Aho, within! Thine eyes be- 
gummed and this the Christ-eve and mornin' 
come? Scatter! Petro, stand ahand! I do 
fetch ye sucklings agagged with apples red. 
Ye gad, my mouth doth slime! To whiff a 
hungerfull would make the sages wag." 

(Petro) " Amorrow, Tito. Thee'lt wear 
thee white as our own Lady long afore ye 
e'en canst dip thy finger in the drip." 

(Tito) " Pst! Petro, I did steal the brain 
and tung. Canst leave me have a peep now to 
the hall ? Jesu ! V^Tiat a breeder o' sore bellies. 
I'd pay my price to heaven to rub Sir John a 
briskish rub with mullien o'er the back, 

" They do tell me down below that trouble 
bideth Timon. His Tina layeth dull and Leta 
doth little but mumble prayer." 

(Petro) " Tito, thee art a chanter of sad 
lays at this Christ-time. Go thou to the 
turret and play ye at the pipes. Put thee the 
sucklings to the kitchen, aside the fire dogs 
there. And Tito, thee'lt find a pudding pan 



THE PROSE 133 

ahind the brushbox. Go thee and lick it 
there!" 

{To Sir John) " Aye, I do come, my lord. 
'Tis but the sucklers come. I know not where 
in the castle she doth bide, but hark ye and yell 
surely hear the pipes." 

(Sir John) "Bah! Damn the drivelling 
pipes! I do hear them late and early. 'Tis a 
fine bird for a lordly nest ! Go, fetch her here ! 
But no, I'd tweak her at a vaster sitting. Get 
thee, thou grunting swine! And take this as 
thy Christ-gift. I'd deal thee thrice the meas- 
ure wert not to save these lordly legs. Here, 
fetch me a courser. I'd ride me to the hounds. 
And strip him of his foot cloth, that I do waste 
me not a blow. Dost like the smart? Or shall 
I ply it more ? Thee'lt dance to tune, or damn 
ye, run from cuts! 

" Ho, Timon, how goes it with the brat? 
The world's o'erfuU o' cattle now! " 

(Timon) "Yea, sire, so did my Leta say 
when she did see thee come. 'Tis with our 
Tina as a bird behovered in the day. Aday, 
and God forgive thee." 



1345 PATIENCE WORTH 

(In Lady Marye's Chamber.) 

{Lady Marye) " Jana, morn hath come. 
'Tis Christ-tide and He not here! My limbs 
do fail, and how do I then to stand me thro' 
the day? The feast, the feast, yea, the feast! 
The day doth break thro' fog in truth! 

*' My mother's bridal robe! Go, Jana, fetch 
it me, and one small holly bough. Lend me a 
hand. I fain would see the cot. 

*' See thou! The sun doth love it, too, and 
chooseth him to rise him o'er its roof! Hath 
thee seen the herder yet to buckle loose the 
shelter place? And, Jana, did all seem well to 
thee? Nay, the Stranger, Jana! See, he still 
doth hold the lamb ! * My Marye, 'tis a game 
o' buff, this living o' these days o' ours.' In 
truth, 'tis put. 

" Jana, I did dream me like a babe the night 
hours through; a dream so sweet, o' vast blue 
above wherein the angels hid, and I did see the 
Christ-child swaddled in a cloud; and Mary, 
maid of sorrows, led to him adown a silver 
beam. 



THE PROSE 135 

" Then thee dost deem my fitful fancy did 
but play me false? Stay thou, my tears, and, 
heart o' me, who knoweth He doth watch o'er 
thee and me? 

'' Her robe! Ah, Fancy, 'tis thy right that 
thou art ever doubted. For thou art a con- 
jurer, a trickster, verily. What chamming * 
joy didst thee then offer her? 

" Thou cloud of billowed lace, a shield be- 
fitting her pure heart! And I the flowering 
of the bud! Hear me, all this o' her! I love 
thee well, and should the day but offer a bitter 
draft to quaff, 'tis but to whet me for a sweeter 
drink. And mother, heart o' me, hearken and 
do believe. I love my sire. Sir John. 

" Come, Jana. Hear ye the carolers? Their 
song doth filter thro' my heart and lighten it. 
The snow doth tweak aneath their feet like 
pipes to 'company them. Cast ye a bit o' holly 
and a mistletoe. 

" The f casters come to whet them with a 
pudding whiff. See, my sire doth ride him up 
the hill and o'er his saddle front a fallow deer. 

* Obsolete form of '* champing." Used here figuratively. 



136 PATIENCE WORTH 

Hear thee the cheering that he comes! Her 
loved, my Jana, and her heart doth beat 
through me ! 

" Christ-love to thee, my sire! Dost hear 
me here? And I do pledge it thee upon His 
precious drops caught by the holly tree. He 
seeth not, but she doth know! " 

[Christmas Eve.) 

{Jana) " My lady, who doth come a knock- 
ing at the door? 'Tis Petro, come to bid ye to 
the feast." 

{Petro) " The candles are long since lit 
and Sirrah John hath weary ed him with jest. 
The feasting hath not yet begun, for he doth 
wait thee to drink a health to feasters in the 
hall." 

{Lady Mar ye) " Yea, Petro, say unto my 
sire, the Lady Marye comes. And say ye 
more, she bids the feasters God-love. And say 
thee more, she doth bear the blessings of her 
Lady Mother who wisheth God's love to them 
all. And fetch ye candle trees to scores, and 
fetch the dulcimer and one who knocketh on its 



THE PROSE 137 

strings, and let him patter forth a lively tune, 
for Lady Marye comes. 

" Jana, look ye once again to the valley 
there. The tapers burn not for Christ-night. 
Nay, a sickly gleam, and see, the Stranger, how 
he doth hold the lamb! And o'er his face a 
smile — or do my eyes beblur, and doth he 
weep?" 

(Jana) " Nay, lady, all is dark. 'Tis but 
the whitish snow and shadow pitted by the 
tapers' light." 

{Lady Marye) " Fetch me then my fan. 
I go to meet my Lord. Doth hear? Already 
they do play. I point me thus, and trip my 
heart's full measure." 

(In the Hall,) 

(Sir John) " So, lily-lip, thee'lt scratch! 
Thy silky paw hath claws, eh? Egad! A 
phantom! A ghoulish trick! My head doth 
split and where my tung? Get ye! Why sit 
like grinning asses! And where thy tungs? 
My God! What scent o' graves she beareth 
with that shroud! " 



138 PATIENCE WORTH 

{Lady Marye) " God cheer, my lord, and 
doth my tripping suit thee well? These flags 
are but my heart and hers, and do I bruise them 
well for thee? Ah, aha! See, I do spread my 
fan. To shield my tears, ye think? Nay, were 
they to fall like Mayday's rain and thee wert 
buried 'neath a stone, as well then could'st thou 
see! And yet I love thee well. See thee, my 
sire, I pour this to thee! 

" Look ye, good people at the feast; the boar 
is ready to slip its bones. 

{Aside) " God, send Thy mantling love 
here to Thine own! For should I judge, when 
Thou I know dost love the saint and sinner as 
Thine own? 

" To thee, my sire, to thee! " 



And gusted wind did flick the tapers out and 
they did hear her murmuring " The Stranger! 
He doth bid me come! " 

And to this day they tell that Lady Marye 
cast the wine into a suckler's mouth and never 
did she drink! 



THE PROSE 139 

" By all the saints ! Do thee go and search ! " 
Thus spake her sire, Sir John. And all the 
long night thro' the torches gleamed, but all in 
vain. And they do say that Sirrah John did 
shake him in a chilling and flee him to a friar, 
while still the search did last. 

{In Timons Cot,) 

(Leta) " Timon, waken ye! Our Leta still 
doth court her dreams and I do weary me. 
The long night thro' the feasters cried them 
thro' the hills and none but Him could shield 
our Tina from their din. 

" Take heart, my lad, I fear me yet to look 
within the crib. Hold thou my hand, man. 
Nay, not yet ! Come, waken Leta that she then 
do feed thy lambs." 

(Timon) " Come, Leta, wake! The sun 
hath tipped the crown o' yonder hill and spread 
a blush adown her snow-white side." 

(Leta) " Yea, sire. And Tina, how be 
she?" 

(Timon) " A fairy, sleeping. Tad." 

(Leta) " Ah, sire, but I did dream the dark 



140 PATIENCE WORTH 

o' yesterday away. And, mother, she doth 
strain unto the sun! I see her eyes be-glist- 
ened. See, the frost-cart dumped beside our 
door, and look ye! he, the Frost man, put a 
cap upon the chimney pot. I'll fetch a brush 
and fan away his cloak. My Christ-gift, it 
would be my Tina's smile. She did know me 
not at late o' night; think ye it were the dark? 
Stay, sire! I'll cast the straw and put the 
sheep aright!" (Eccit,) 

{Timon) " My Leta, come ! Thy Christ- 
gift bideth o'er our Tina's lips and she doth 
coo!" 

(Leta) " Timon, call aloud, that she hear- 
eththee. Leta! Leta! Little one! Dost hear 
thy sire to call? Why, what's amiss with thee? 
Thy staring eyes, my child! Speak thou! " 

(Leta) " Sh-e-e-e! Sire, His mother's 
come! And, ah, my heart! All white she be 
an' crushed unto her breast a holly bough, and 
one white arm doth circle o'er a lamb! See, 
sire, the snow did drift it thro' and weave a 
fairy robe to cover her." 



THE PROSE 141 

{Timon) "Who ieaveth by the door; a 
stranger? " 

(Leta) " Nay, He bideth here." 

{Timon) " The Lady Marye, on my soul! 
Leta, drop ye here thy tears, for madness bid- 
eth loosed upon the earth ! And shouldst " 

{Leta) " Nay, sire! Who cometh there? " 



And searchers there did find the Lady 
Marye, dead, amid the lambs and snow — a 
flowering o' the rose upon a bush o' thorn. 

And hark ye! At the time when winter's 
blast doth sound, thee'lt hear the wailing o' the 
Lady Marye's pipes, and know the Stranger 
bideth o'er the earth. 



The two dramatic stories presented here 
were but a paving of the way for larger work. 
" The Stranger " had been hardly completed 
when Patience announced, " Thee'lt sorry 
at the task I set thee next." And then she 
began the construction of a drama that in its 
delivery consumed the time of the sittings for 
several weeks, and it contained when finished 
some 20,000 words. It is divided into six acts, 
each with a descriptive prologue, and three of 
the acts have two scenes each, making nine 
scenes in all. It, like the two shorter sketches, 
is medieval in scene, and the pictures which it 
presents of the customs and costumes and man- 
ners of the thirteenth or fourteenth century 
(the period is not definitely indicated) are 
amazingly vivid. It has a somewhat intricate 
plot, which is carried forward rapidly and its 
strands skillfully interwoven until the nature 
of the fabric is revealed in the sixth act. This 
play is much more skillfully constructed in 
respect of stage technique than the two play- 

142 



THE PROSE 143 

lets that preceded it, and it could, no doubt, 
be produced upon the stage with perhaps a 
little alteration to adapt it to modern condi- 
tions. Some idea of its beauty, its sprightli- 
ness and its humor may be obtained from the 
prologue to the first act, which follows: 

Wet earth, fresh trod. 

Highway cut to wrinkles with cart wheels 
born in with o'erloading. A flank o' daisy 
flowers and stones rolled o'er in blanketing o' 
moss. Brown o' young oak-leaves shows soft 
amid the green. Adown a steep unto the vale, 
hedged in by flowering fruit and threaded 
through with streaming silver o' the brook, 
where rushes shiver like to swishing o' a lady's 
silk. 

Moss-lipped log doth case the spring who 
mothereth the brook, and ivy hath climbed it 
o'er the trunk and leafless branch o' yonder 
birch, till she doth stand bedecked as for a 
folly dance. 

Rat-a-tat ! Rat-a-tat ! 
Rat-a-tat ! Sh-h-h-h ! 



144 PATIENCE WORTH 

From out the thick where hides the logged 
and mud-smeared shack. 

Rat-a-tat ! Rat-a-tat ! 
Sh-h-h-h! 
And hark ye, to the tanner's song ! 

Up, up, up ! and down, down, down ! 
A hammer to smite 

And a hand to pound ! 
A maid to court. 

And a swain to woo, 
A heifFer felled 

And I build a shoe ! 
A souse anew in yonder vat, 

And I'll buy my lady 
A feathered hat! 

The play then begins with the tanner and 
his apprentice, and the action soon leads to the 
royal castle, where the exquisite love story is 
developed, without a love scene. There is no 
tragedy in the story. It is all sentiment, and 
humor. And it is filled with poetry. Consider, 
for example, this description of Easter morn, 
from the prologue to the sixth act: 



THE PROSE 145 

The earth did wake with boughs aburst. A 
deadened apple twig doth blush at casting 
Winter's furry coat, to find her naked blooms 
abath in sun. The feathered hosts, atuned, do 
carol, " He hath risen! " E'en the crow with 
envy trieth melody and soundeth as a brass; 
and listening, loveth much his song. Young 
grasses send sweet-scented damp through the 
hours of risen day. The bell, atoll, doth bid 
the village hence. E'en path atraced through 
velvet fields hath flowered with fringing bloom 
and jeweled drops, atempting tarriers. The 
sweet o' sleep doth grace each venturing face. 
The kine stand knee depth within the silly- 
tittered brook, or deep in bog awallow. Soft 
breath ascent and lazy-eyed, they wait them 
for the stripping-maid. 

The play is permeated with rich humor, and 
to illustrate this I give a bit of the dialogue 
between Dougal, the page, and Anne, the 
castle cook. To appreciate it one must know 
a little of the story. The hand of the Princess 
Ermaline is sought by Prince Charlie, a dod- 



146 PATIENCE WORTH 

dering old rake, whom she detests, but whom 
for reasons of state she may be compelled to 
accept. However, she vows she will not speak 
while he is at com-t, nor does she utter a word, 
in the play, until the end of the last act. She 
has fallen in love with a troubadour, who has 
come from no one knows where, but who by his 
grace and Ms wit and his intelligence has made 
himself a favorite with all the castle folk. 
Anne has a roast on the spit, and is scouring a 
pot with sand and rushes, when Dougal enters 
the kitchen. 

Dougal, — " Anne, goody girl, leave me but 
suck a bone. My sides have withered and 
fallen in, in truth." 

Anne. — " Get ye, Dougal! Thy footprints 
do show them in grease like to the Queen's 
seal upon my floor! " 

Doug ah — " The princess hath bidden me to 
stay within her call, but she doth drouse, 
adrunk on love-lilt o' the troubadour, and 
Prince of Fools (Prince Charlie) hath gone 
long since to beauty sleep. He tied unto his 
poster a posey wreath, and brushed in scented 



THE PROSE 147 

oils his beauteous locks, and sung a lay to 
Ermaline, and kissed a scullery wench afore 
he slept." 

Anne. — "The dog! I'd love a punch to 
shatter him! And Ermaline hath vowed to 
lock her lips and pass as mute until his going." 

DougaL — " Yea, but eye may speak, for hers 
do flash like lightning, and though small, her 
foot doth fall most weighty to command. 

" Yester, the Prince did seek her in the 
throne room. He'd tied his kerchief to a sack 
and filled it full o' blue-bells, and minced him 
'long the halls astrewing blossoms and singing 
like to a frozen pump. 

" Within the chamber, Ermaline did hide her 
face in dreading to behold him come, but at the 
door he spied the dear and bounded like a 
puppy 'cross the flags, apelting her with blooms 
and sputtering 'mid tee-hees. She, tho', did 
spy him first, and measured her his sight and 
sudden slipped her 'neath the table shroud. 
And he, Anne, I swear, sprawled him in his 
glee and rose to find her gone. And whacked 
my shin, the ass, acause I heaved at shoulders." 



148 PATIENCE WORTH 

Anne. — " Ah, Dougal, 'tis a weary time, in 
truth. Thee hadst best to put it back, to court 
thy mistress' whim. Good sleep, ye! And 
Dougal, I have a loving for the troubadour. 
Whence cometh he? " 

Dougal. — " Put thy heart to rest, good 
Anne; he's but a piper who doth knock the 
taber's end and coaxeth trembling strings by 
v/hich to sing. He came him out o' nothing, 
like to the night or day. We waked to hear 
him singing 'neath the wall." 

Anne. — "Aye, but I do wag! For surely 
thee doth see how Ermaline doth court his 
song." 

Dougal. — " Nay, Anne, 'tis but to fill an 
empty day." 



When Patience had finished this she preened 
herself a little. " Did I not then spin a lengthy- 
tale? " she asked. But immediately she be- 
gan work upon another, a story of such length 
that it alone will make a book. It differs in 
many respects from her other works, particu- 
larly in the language, and from a literary 
standpoint is altogether the most amazing of 
her compositions. This, too, is dramatic in 
form, but scene often merges into scene with- 
out division, and it has more of the character- 
istics of the modern story. It is, however, 
medieval, but it is a tale of the fields, primarily, 
the heroine, Telka, being a farm lass, and the 
hero a field hand. Perhaps this is why the 
obscure dialectal forms of rural England of a 
time long gone by are woven into it. In this 
Patience makes an astonishingly free use of 
the prefix "a," in place of a number of pre- 
fixes, such as " be " and " with," now com- 
monly used, and she attaches it to nouns and 

149 



150 PATIENCE WORTH 

verbs and adjectives with such frequency as to 
make this usage a prominent feature of the 
diction. Let me introduce Telka in the words 
of Patience : 

" Dewdamp soggeth grasses laid low aneath 
the blade at yester's harvest, and thistle-bloom 
weareth at its crown a jewelled spray. 

" Brown thrush, nested 'neath the thick o' 
yonder shrub, hath preened her wings full long 
aneath the tender warmth o' morning sun. 

" Afield the grasses glint, and breeze doth 
seeming set aflow the current o' a green -waved 
stream. 

" Soft-footed strideth Telka, bare toes 
asink in soft earth and bits o' green acling, 
bedamped, unto her snowy limbs. Smocked 
brown and aproned blue, she seemeth but a 
bit o' earth and sky alight amid the field. 
Asplit at throat, the smock doth show a busom 
like to a sheen o' fleecy cloud aveiling o'er the 
sun's first flush. 

" Betanned the cheek, and tresses bleached 
by sun at every twist of curl. Strong hands 



THE PROSE 151 

do clasp a branch long dead and dried, at end 
bepronged, and casteth fresh-cut blades to 
heap." 

Such is Telka in appearance. " She seemeth 
but a bit o' earth and sky alight amid the field." 
Seemeth, yes, but there is none of the sky in 
Telka. She is of the earth, earthy, an intensely 
practical young woman, industrious, econom- 
ical, but with no sense of beauty whatever, no 
imagination, no thought above the level of the 
ground. " I fashioned jugs o' clay," her 
father complained, " and filled with bloom, and 
she becracked their necks and kept the swill 
therein." Add to this a hot temper and a sharp 
tongue, and the character of Telka is revealed. 
Franco, the lover, on the other hand, is an 
artist and poet, although a field worker. He 
has been reared, as a foundling, by the friars 
in the neighboring monastery, and they have 
taught him something of the arts of mosaics 
and the illumination of missals. Between these 
two is a constant conflict of the material and 
the spiritual, and the theme of the story is the 



152 PATIENCE WORTH 

spiritual regeneration or development of 
Telka. 

" See," says Franco, " Yonder way-rose 
hath a bloom ! She be a thrifty wench and hath 
saved it from the spring." 

Telka, — " I hate the thorned thing. Its 
barb hath pricked my flesh and full many a 
rent doth show it in my smock." 

Franco, — " Ah, Telka, thine eyes do look 
like yonder blue and shimmer like to brook- 
let's breast." 

Telka. — " The brooklet be bestoned, and 
muddied by the swine. Thy tung doth trip 
o'er pretty words." 

Franco. — " But list, Telka, I would have 
thee drink from out my cup ! " 

Telka. — " Ah, show me then the cup." 

And Telka's father, a wise old man, cautions 
Franco : 

" Thee hadst best to take a warning. Franco. 
She be o' the field and rooted there; and thee 
o' the field, but reaped, and bound to free thee 



THE PROSE 153 

of the chaff by flailing of the world. She then 
would be to thee but straw and waste to cast 
awhither." 

But an understanding of the nature of this 
strange tale and its peculiar dialect requires 
a longer extract. The " Story of the Judge 
Bush " will serve, better perhaps than anything 
else, to convey an idea of the characters of 
Telka and Franco, as well as to illustrate the 
language; and the episode is interesting in 
itself. The dialogue opens with Telka, Franco 
and Marion on their way to Telka's hut. 
Marion is Telka's dearest friend, although one 
gets a contrary impression from Telka's 
caustic remarks in this excerpt; but unlike 
Telka, she can understand and appreciate the 
poetic temperament of Franco. To show her 
contempt for Franco's aspirations, Telka has 
taken his color pots and buried them in a 
dung-heap, and this characteristic act is the 
foundation of the " Story of the Judge Bush." 

{Franco) " Come, we do put us to a-dry. 
'Tis sky aweep, and 'tis a gray day from now. 



154j patience WORTH 

I tell thee, Telka, we then put us to hearth, 
and spin ye shall. And thou, Marion, shalt 
bake an ash loaf and put o' apples for to burst 
afore the fire. 'Tis chill, the whine-wind o' the 
storm. We then shall spin a tale by turn ; and 
Telka, lass, I plucked a sweet bloom for thee 
to wear. Thine eye hath softened, eh, my 
lass ? Here, set thy nose herein and thou canst 
ne'er to think a tho't besoured." 

(Telka) ''Ah, 'tis a wise lad I wed, who 
spendeth o' his stacking hours to pluck weed, 
and thee wouldst have me sniff the dung-dust 
from their leaf. Do cast them whither, and 
'pon thy smock do wipe thy hand. It be my 
fancy for to waste the gray hours aside the 
fire's glow, — but, Franco, see ye, the wee pigs 
asqueal! 'Tis nay liking the wet. Do fetch 
them hence. Here, Marion, cast my cape 
about thee, since thou dost wear thy pettiskirt 
and Sabboth smock. Gad ! Blue maketh thee 
to match a plucked goose. Thy skin already 
hath seamed, I vow. And, Marion, 'tis 'deed a 
flash to me thy tress be red ! Should I to bear 
a red top I'd cast it whither." 



THE PROSE 155 

(Franco) " Telka, Telka, drat thy barbed 
tung! Cast thou the bolt. Gad! What a 
scent o' browning joint!" 

(Telka) " Do leave me for to turn the spit 
that I may lick the finger-drip. Thy nose, 
Franco, doth trick thee. Thou canst sniff o' 
dung-dust and scoff at drip. Go, roll the 
apples o'er in yonder pile. They then would 
suit thee well! " 

(Franco) " Telka, I bid thee to wash away 
such tunging. Here, I set them so. Now do 
I to fetch thy wheel. Nay, Marion, do cast 
thy blush. 'Tis but the Telka witch. Do thou 
to start thee at thy tale aspin." 

(Telka) "Aye, Marion, thou then, since 
ne'er truth knoweth thee, thou shouldst ne'er 
to lack for story. Story do I say? Aye, or 
lie, 'tis brothers they be. And, Franco, do thou 
to spin, 'twill suit thy taste to feed 'pon maid's 
fare. I be the spinner o' the tale afirst. But, 
Franco, I fain would have thee fetch a pair o' 
barkers. Didst deem to fret me that thee 
dumped the twain aneath the stack? Go thou 
and fetch. 'Tis well that thee shouldst bed 



156 PATIENCE WORTH 

with swine lest thee be preening for a 
swan." 

(Franco) " Ugh, Telka! Thou art like to 
a vat o' wine awork. Thou'lt fetch the swine 
do ye seek to company them." 
V (Telka) " So well, Polly, I do go, for 'tis 
swine o' worth amore than color daub. Set 
thee, since thou be wench." 

(Franco) " Look ye, Telka, 'tis here I cast 
the cloak and show thee metal abared. Thou 
hast ridden 'pon a high nag for days, and I 
do kick his hock and set him at a limp. Do 
thou to clip thy words ashort or I do cast a 
stone athro' thy bubble." 

(Telka) "Ah, Franco, 'tis nay meaning! 
Put here. Do spin thy tale, but do ye first to 
leave me fetch the wee-squeals. Then I do 
be a tamed dove. See ye? " 

(Franco) " Away, then, and fetch thee 
back ahurry." (Eaiit Telka.) 

(Franco) " Marion, 'tis what that I should 
put as path to tread? She be awronged but do 
I feed the fires, or put a stop ? " 

(Marion) " Franco, 'tis a pot and stew she 



THE PROSE 157 

loveth. Think ye to coax thy dream-forms 
from out the pot? Telka arounded and 
awrathed be like unto a thunder-storm, but 
Telka less the wrath and round, be Winter's 
dreary." 

{Franco) " Not so, Marion, I shall then 
call forth the ghosts o' painted pots and touch 
the dreary abloom. Didst thou e'er to slit thy 
eye and view thro' afar? Dost thou then be- 
hold the motes? So, then, shall I to view the 
Telka maid. Whist! Here she be! Aback, 
Telka? Come, I itch for to spin a tale. Sit 
thee here and dry the wet sparkles from thy 
curls. List, do! 

" 'Twere a peddle-packer who did stroll 
adown the blade-strewn path along the village 
edge, abent. And brow-shagged eye did hide 
a twinkle-mirth aneath " 

"E-e-ek! E-e-e-k!" 

{Telka) " Look, Franco, see they ' e-e-e-k ' 
do I to pull their tails uncurl! " 

{Franco) " Do ye then wish thee, Telka, 
for to play upon their one-string lyre, or do I 
put ahead? " 



158 PATIENCE WORTH 

" Bestrung, aborder o' the road, the cots 
send smoke-wreathes up to join the cloud. 
'Twere sup -hour, and drip afrazzle soundeth 
thro' the doors beope, like to a water-cachit 
aslipping thro' dry leaf to pool aneath. Do I 
then put it clear? " 

(Telka) " Yea, Franco, what hath he in 
his pack? I'd put a gander for a frock! " 

(Marion) " On, Franco, thy tale hath a 
lilt." 

{Franco) " A wag- walk he weaveth to the 
door afirst-hand. The wee lads and lass do 
cluster 'bout the door, and twist atween their 
finger and thumb their smock-hem, or chew 
thereon. But he doth seem aloth to cast of 
pack or ope, and standeth at apeer to mm^mur 
— then to cast." 

"E-e-e-k! E-e-e-k!" 

{Telka) " Nay, Franco, 'twere not my 
doing, I swear. 'Twere he who sat upon a fire- 
spark. Do haste! I hot for sight atliin the 
pack." 

{Franco) " What, Telka, thou awag and 
pig asqueak, and me the tail! Do put quiet! 



THE PROSE 159 

" The dame and sire do step them out from 
gray innards o' the hut, and pack-tipper beg- 
geth for a mug o' porridge, and showeth o' the 
strand-bound pack. Wee lads and lass 
aquiver, tip-topple at a peep, and dame doth 
fetch the brew, but shaketh nay at offering o' 
gift, and spake it so : 'A porridge pot doth 
hold a mug, and one amore for he who bideth 
'thout a brew. Nay, drink ye, and thank the 
morrow's sun. 'Tis stony path thee trod, and 
dust choketh. Do rest, and bide thee at our 
sill till weariness awarn away.' 

" Think ye, Marion, that peddle-man did 
leave and cast not pence? What think ye, 
Telka?" 

(Telka) " I did hear thee tell o' his fill, but 
tell thee o' fill o' pack." 

(Franco) " A time, Telka. Nay, he did 
drink and left as price an ancient jug o' clay, 
and thick and o' a weight, to thank and wag- 
weave hence." 

(Telka) " Did he then to pack anew and 
off 'thout a peep? " 

(Franco) " Yea, and dark did yawn and 



160 PATIENCE WORTH 

swallow him. But morrow bringeth tale that 
peddle-packer had paid to each o' huts a beg, 
and what think ye? Left a jug where'er he 
supped!" 

(Telka) " 'Twere a clayster, and the 
morrow findeth him afollow for price, 
egh? " 

(Franco) " Nay, Telka, not so. And jugs 
ashaken soundeth like to a wine; but atip did 
show nay drop. Marion, do tweak the Telka — 
she be aslumber." 

(Marion) " Wake thee, Telka, the jugs be 
now to crack." 

(Telka) " Nay, 'tis a puddle o' a tale — a 
packster and a strand-bound pack, aweary." 

(Franco) " But list thee! For 'twere eve 
that found the dames awag. For tho' they set 
the jugs aright, there be but dust where they 
did stand. Yea, all, Telka maid, save that the 
peddle-man did give to dame at first hand. 
The gabble put it so, that 'twere the porridge 
begged that dames did fetch but for a hope o' 
price, where jugs ashrunk." 

(Telka) "But 'twere such a scm'vey, 



THE PROSE 161 

Franco! I wage the jug aleft doth leak. 
What think ye I be caring 'bout jug or peddle- 
packer? " 

(Marion) " Snip short thy word, Telka. 
Leave Franco for to tell. I be aprick for 
scratch to ease the itch o' wonder. On, lad, 
and tie the ends o' weave-strand." 

(Franco) " 'Tis told the dame did treasure 
o' the jug, and sire did shew abroad the won- 
der, and all did list unto the swish o' ' nothing 
wine,' and thirsted for asup, and each did 
tip its crook'd neck and shake, but ne'er a drop 
did slip it through. And wonder, Marion, the 
sides did sweat like to a damp within! So 
'twere. The townsmen shook awag their heads 
and feared the witch-work or the wise man's 
cunger, and they did bid the sire to dig a pit 
and put therein the jug." 

(Telka) " 'Twere waste they wrought, I 
vow, for should ye crack away its neck 'twould 
then be fit for holding o' the swill. There be 
a pair ahind the stack." 

(Franco) " Nay, Telka, not as this, for 
they did dig a pit and plant jug therein, and 



162 PATIENCE WORTH 

morrow showed from out the fresh-turned 
earth a bush had sprung, and on its every 
branch a bud o' many colored hue ahke to 
rainbow's robe. And lo, the dames and sires 
did cluster 'bout, and each did pluck a twig 
aladen with the bud, but as 'twere snapped, 
what think ye ? There be in the hand a naught 
— save when the dame who asked not price did 
pluck. And 'tis told that to this day the to^\Tis- 
men fetch unto the bush and force apluck do 
they make question o' their brotherman. And 
so 'tis with he who fashions o' the rainbow's 
robe a world to call liis own, and fetcheth to 
the grown bush his brother for to shew, and 
he seeth not, 'tis so he judge." 

(Telka) " O, thou art a story-spinner o' a 
truth, and peddle-packer too, egh? And thou 
dost deem that thou hast planted o' thy pot to 
force thy bush by which ye judge. Paugh! 
Thou art a fool. Franco, and thy pots o' color 
be not aworth thy pains. So thou dost think 
then I be plucking o' naught aside thy bush. 
Well, I do tell thee this. Thy pots ne'er as 
the jug shall spring. Nay, for morn found me 



THE PROSE 163 

adig, and I did cast them here to the fire, af ear- 
ing they should haunt." 

(Franco) " 'Tis nuff, Telka, I leave them 
to the flame. But thou shouldst know the bush 
abud doth show in every smouldering blaze." 

(Telka) " See, Franco, I be yet neck 
ahead, for I do spat upon the flame and lo, 
thy bush be naught! " 

(Franco) " Aye, 'tis so, but there be ahid 
a place thou ne'er hast seen. Therein I put 
what be mine own — the love for them. Thou 
art a butterfly, Telka, abeating o' thy wing 
upon a thistle-leaf. Do hover 'bout the 
blooms thou knowest best and leave dream- 
bush and thistle-leaf." 

It is a remarkable story. Many lines are 
gems of wit or wisdom or beauty, and it con- 
tains some exquisite poetry. There are many 
characters in it, all of them lovable but Telka, 
and she becomes so ere the end. 

A curious and interesting fact in this con- 
nection is that after beginning this story Pa- 
tience used its peculiar form of speech in her 



164 PATIENCE WORTH 

conversation and in her poems. Previously, as 
I have pointed out, there was a natural and 
consistent difference between her speech and 
her writings, and it would seem that in this 
change she would show that she is not subject 
to any rules, nor limited to the dialect of any 
period or any locality. Scattered through this 
present volume are poems, prose pieces and 
bits of her conversation, in which the curious 
and frequent use of the prefix a-, the abbrevia- 
tion of the word " of " and the strange twists 
of phrase of the Telka story are noticeable. 
All of these were received after this story was 
begun. 

But there is another form of prose composi- 
tion that Patience has given to us. While she 
is writing a story she does not confine herself 
to that work, but precedes or follows it with a 
bit of gossip, a personal message, a poem or 
something else. Sometimes she stops in the 
midst of her story to deliver something entirely 
foreign to it that comes into her mind. Dur- 
ing one week, while " Telka " was being re- 



THE PROSE 165 

ceived, she presented three parables, all in the 
peculiar language of that story. I reproduce 
them here and leave it to the reader to ponder 
o'er their meaning. 



^&' 



" Long, yea, long agone, aside a wall atilt 
who joined unto a brother- wall and made 
atween a gap apoint abacked, there did upon 
the every day, across-leged, sit a bartmaker, 
amid his sacks aheaped. And ne'er a buy did 
tribesmen make. Nay, but 'twere the babes 
y/ho sought the bartman, and lo, he shutteth 
both his eyes and babes do pilfer from the 
sacks and feed thereon, till sacks asink. And 
still at crosslegs doth he sit. 

" Yea, and days do follow days till Winter 
setteleth 'pon his locks its snow. Aye, and lo, 
at rise o' sun 'pon such an day as had followed 
day since first he sat, they did see that he had 
ashrunked and they did wag that 'twere 
the wasting o' his days at sitting at cross- 
leg. 

" And yet the babes did fetch for feast and 
wert fed. Till last a day did dawn and gap 



166 PATIENCE WORTH 

ashowed it empty and no man woed ; but babes 
did sorry 'bout the spot 'till tribesmen mar- 
veled and fetched alongside and coaxed with 
sweets their word. But no man found answer 
in their prate. And they did ope remaining 
sacks and lo, there be anaught save dry fruit, 
and babes did reach forth for it and wert fed, 
and more, it did nurture them, and they went 
forth alater to the fields o' earth astrengthened 
and fed 'pon — what, Brother? List ye. 'Pon 
truth." 

" There be aside the market's place a mer- 
chant and a brother merchant. Aye, and one 
did put price ahigh, and gold aclinketh and 
copper groweth mold atween where he did 
store. And his brother giveth measure full and 
more, for the pence o' him who offereth but 
pence, at measure that runneth o'er to full o' 
gold's price. 

" And lo, they do each to buy o' herds, and he 
who hath full price buyeth but the shrunk o' 
herd, and he who hath little, buyeth the full o' 
herd. And time maketh full the sacks o' him 



THE PROSE 167 

who hoardeth gold, and layeth at aflat the sacks 
o' him who maketh poor price. And lo, he who 
hath plenty hoardeth more, and he who had 
little buyed o' seed and sowed and reaped 
therefrom. And famine crept it nearer and 
fringed 'pon the land and smote the land o' 
him who asacketh o' gold and crept it 'pon the 
land o' him o' pence. 

" And herds did low o' hunger and he who 
hath but gold hath naught to feed thereon. 
For sacks achoked 'pon gold. And he who had 
but pence did sack but grain and grass and fed 
the herd. And lo, they fattened and did fill 
the emptied sacks with gold, while he who hath 
naught but gold did sick, and famine wasted o' 
his herd and famine's sun did rise to shine 'pon 
him astricken 'pon gold asacked." 

" There wert a man and his brother and they 
wrought them unalike. Yea, and one did 
fashion from wood, and ply till wonderwork 
astood, a temple o' wood. And his brother 
fashioneth o' reeds and worketh wonder bas- 
kets. And he who wrought o' wood scoffeth. 



168 PATIENCE WORTH 

And the tribesmen make buy o' baskets and 
wag that 'tis a-sorry wrought the temple, and 
spake them that the Lord would smite, and lay 
it low. For he who wrought did think him o' 
naught save the high and wide o' it, and looked 
not at its strength or yet its stand 'pon earth. 
And they did turn the baskets 'bout and put 
to strain, and lo, they did hold. And it were 
the tribesmen, who shook their heads and mur- 
mured, ' Yea, yea, they be a goodly.' 

" So 'tis; he who doth fashion from wood o' 
size doth prosper not, and he who doth fashion 
o' reed and small, doth thrive verily." 

These are all somewhat cryptic, although 
their interpretation is not difficult, but that 
which follows on the magic of a laugh needs no 
explanation. "I do fashion out a tale for 
babes," said Patience, when she presented this 
parable of the fairy's wand, and in it she gives 
expression to another one of her characteristics, 
one that is intensely human, the love of laugh- 
ter, which she seems to like to hear and often 
to provoke. 



THE PROSE 169 

" Lo, at a time thou knowest not, aye, I, thy 
handmaid, knowest not, there wert born unto 
the earth a babe. And lo, the dame o' this 
babe wert but a field's woman. And lo, days 
and days did pass until the fullness of the 
babe's days, and it stood in beauty past word 
o' me. 

" Yea, and there wert a noble, and he did 
pass, and lo, his brow was darked, and smile 
had forsook his lips. And he came unto the 
cot and there stood the babe, who wert now a 
maid o' lovely. And he spaked unto her and 
said: 

" * Come thou, and unto the lands of me 
shall we make way. Thou art not o' the fields, 
but for the nobles.' 

" And she spake not unto his word. And lo, 
the mother of the babe came forth and this 
man told unto her of this thing, that her babe 
wert not of the field but for the nobled. And, 
at the bidding of the noble, she spake, yea, the 
maid should go unto his lands. 

" And time and time after the going, lo, no 



170 PATIENCE WORTH 

word came unto the mother. And within the 
lands of the noble the maid lived, and lo, the 
days wert sorry, and the paths held but 
shadows, and nay smiles shed gold imto the 
hom-s. And she smiled that this noble did 
offer unto her much of royal stores. Yea, 
gems, and gold, and all a maid might wish, 
and she looked in pity unto the noble and 
spake : 

" ' What hast thou? Lo, thou hast brought 
forth of thy store and given unto me, and 
what doth it buy? Thy lips are ever sorry and 
thy hours dark. Then take thou these gifts 
and keep within such an day as thine, for, hark 
ye, my dame, the field's woman, hath given 
unto me that which setteth at a naught thy 
gifts ; for hark ye : mid thy dark o' sorry I shall 
spill a laugh, and it be a fairies' wand, and 
turneth dust to gold.' 

" And she fled unto the sun's paths of the 
fields. 

" Verily do I to say unto thee, this, the 
power of the fairies' wand, is thine, thy gift of 
thy field-mother, Earth. Then cast out that 



THE PROSE 171 

which earth-lands do offer unto thee and flee 
with thy gift." 

It is somewhat difficult to select an ending 
for this chapter on the prose of Patience: the 
material for it is so abundant and so varied, 
but this " Parable of the Cloak " may perhaps 
form a fitting finish : 

" There wert a man, and lo, he did to seek 
and quest o' sage, that which he did mouth 
o'ermuch. And lo, he did to weave o' such an 
robe, and did to clothe himself therein. And 
lo, 'twer sun ashut away, and cool and heat and 
bright and shade. 

" And lo, still did he to draw 'bout him the 
cloak, and 'twer o' the mouthings o' the sage. 
And lo, at a day 'twer sent abroad that Truth 
should stalk 'pon Earth, and man, were he to 
look him close, shouldst see. 

" And lo, the man did draw 'bout him the 
cloak, and did to wag him ' Nay ' and * Nay, 
'twer truth the sages did to mouth and I did 
weave athin the cloak o' me,' 



172 PATIENCE WORTH 

" And then 'twer that Truth did seek o' 
Earth, and she wert clad o' naught, and seeked 
the man, and begged that he would cast the 
cloak and clothe o' her therein. And lo, he 
did to draw him close the cloak, and hid his 
face therein, and wag him ' Nay,' he did to 
know her not. 

" And lo, she did to fetch her unto him 
athrice, and then did he to wag him still a 
' Nay! Nay! Nay! ' And lo, she toucheth o' 
the cloth o' sage's mouths and it doth fall 
atattered and leave him clothed o' naught, and 
at a wishing. And he did seek o' Truth, aye, 
ever, and when he did to find, lo, she wagged 
him nay, and nay, and nay." 



CONVERSATIONS 

" This be bread. If man knoweth not the grain 
from which 'twer fashioned, what then? 'Tis bread. 
Let man deny me this." — Patience Worth. 

But after all, perhaps the truest conception 
of the character and versatility of Patience can 
be acquired from her " conversations." The 
word "conversation" I here loosely apply to all 
that comes from her in the course of an even- 
ing, excepting the work on her stories. The 
poems and parables are usually woven into her 
remarks with a sequence that suggests ex- 
temporaneous production for the particular 
occasion, although as a rule they are of general 
application. Almost invariably they are 
brought out by something she or someone 
else has said, or as a tribute, a lesson or a com- 
fort to some person who is present. Her 
songs, as she calls her poems, are freely given, 

173 



174 PATIENCE WORTH 

apparently without a thought or a care as to 
what may become of them. They seem to come 
spontaneously, without effort, with no pause 
for thought, no groping for the right word, and 
to fall into their places as part of the spoken 
rather than the written speech. So it is that 
the term " conversation " in this connection is 
made to include much that ordinarily would 
not fall within that designation. 

One of the pleasures of an evening with Pa- 
tience is the uncertainty of the form of the 
entertainment. Never are two evenings ahke 
in the general nature of the communications. 
She adapts herself to circumstances and to the 
company present, serious if they are bent on 
serious subjects, merry if they are so; but sel- 
dom will the serious escape without a little of 
the merry, or the merry without a little of the 
serious. Sometimes her own feelings seem to 
have an influence. Always, however, she is 
permitted to take her own course, except in 
the case of a formal examination, to which she 
readily responds if conducted with respect. 
She may devote the evening largely to poetry. 



CONVERSATIONS 175 

possibly varying the themes, as on one evening 
when she gave a nature poem, one of a rehgious 
character, a lullaby, a humorous verse and a 
prayer, interspersed with discussion. She may 
talk didactically with little or no interruption. 
She may submit to a catechism upon religion, 
philosophy, philology, or any subject that may 
arise. She may devote an evening to a series of 
little personal talks to a succession of sitters, or 
she may elect just to gossip. " I be dame," she 
says, and therefore not averse to gossip. But 
rarely will she neglect to write something on 
whatever story she may have in hand. She 
speaks of such writing as " weaving." " Put 
ye to weave," she will say, and that means that 
conversation is to stop for a time until a little 
real work is accomplished. 

The conversations which follow are selected 
to illustrate the variety of form referred to, as 
well as to introduce a number of interesting 
statements that throw light on the character of 
the phenomena. 

Upon a certain evening the Currans had two 
visitors. Dr. and Mrs. W. With Dr. W. and 



176 PATIENCE WORTH 

Mrs. C. at the board and Mrs. W. leaning over 
it. Patience began: 

"Ah, hark! Here abe athree; yea, love, 
faith and more o' love ! Thee hast for to hark 
unto word I do put o' them, not ye." 

And then she told this tale of the Mite and 
the Seeds: 

" Hark! Aneath the earth fell a seed, and 
lay aside a Mite, a winged mite, who hid from 
cold. Yea, and the Mite knew o' the day o'er 
the Earth's crust, and spake unto the Seed, and 
said: 

" * The hours o' day show sun and cloud, 
aye, and the Earth's crust holdeth grass 
and tree. Aye, and men walk 'pon the 
Earth.' 

" Aye, and the Seed did say unto the Mite: 

" ' Nay, there be a naught save Earth and 
dark, for mine eye hath not beheld what thou 
tellest of.' 

" Yea, and the Mite spake it so: 

" ' 'Tis dark and cold o'er the crust 
o' Earth, and thou and me awarm and 
close ahere.' 



CONVERSATIONS 177 

" But the Seed spake out : ' Nay, this be the 
time I seek me o'er the Earth's crust and see 
the Day thou tellest of.' 

" And lo, he sent out leaf, and reached high. 
And lo, when the leaf* had pushed up from 
'neath the crust, there were snow's cut and cold, 
and it died, and knew not the Day o' the Mite : 
for the time was not riped that he should seek 
unto new days. 

" And lo, the Stalk that had sent forth the 
Seed, sent forth amore, and lo, again a one did 
sink aside the Mite. And he spake to it of the 
Day o' Earth and said : ' Thy brother sought 
the Day, and it wert not time, and lo, he is no 
more.' 

" And he told of the days of Earth unto the 
seed, and it spaked unto him and said : ' This 
day o' thee meaneth naught to me. Lo, I shall 
spring not a root, nor shall I to seek me the 
days o' Earth. Nay, I shall lay me close and 
warm.' 

" And e'en though the Mite spake unto the 
Seed at the time when it wert ripe that it should 
seek, lo, it lay, and Summer's tide found it a 



178 PATIENCE WORTH 

naught, for it feeded 'pon itself, and lo, wert 
not. 

" And at a later ti(}e did a seed to fall, and it 
harked unto the Mite and waited the time, and 
when it wert riped, lo, it upped and sought the 
day. And it wert so as the Mite had spaked. 
And the Seed grew into a bush. 

"And lo, the winged Mite flew out: for it 
had brought a brother out o' the dark and unto 
the Day, and the task wert o'er. 

" These abe like unto them who seek o' the 
words o' me. 

" Now aweave thou." 

Patience then wrote about two hundred 
words of a story, after which Mrs. W. inquired 
of Mr. C: 

" Don't you ever try to write on the board? " 
To which he replied facetiously, " No, I'm too 
dignified." 

Patience, — " Yea, he smirketh unto swine 
and kicketh the nobles." 

Then seeming to feel that the visitors were 



CONVERSATIONS 179 

wanting something more personal than the 
"Tale" she said: 

" Alawk, they be ahungered, and did weave 
a bit. Then hark. Here be. 

" What think ye, man? They do pucker 
much o'er the word o' me, and spat forth that 
thou dost eat and smack o' liking. Yea, but 
hark ! Who shed drop for Him but one o' His, 
yea, the Son o' Him? Think ye this abe the 
pack o' me ? Nay, and thou and thou and thou 
shalt shed drops in loving for the pack, for it 
be o' Him. Now shall I to sing: 

How doth the Mise-man greed, 
And lay unto his store. 
And seek him out the pence of Earth, 
Wherein the hearts do rust? 

How doth the Muse-man greed. 
And seek him o' the Day, 
And word that setteth up a wag — 
While hearts o' Earth are filthed? 

How doth the See-man greed? 
Yea, and how he opeth up his eye, 
And seeth naught and telleth much — 
While hearts of earth are hurt. 



180 PATIENCE WORTH 

How doth the Good-man greed, 

Who dealeth o' the Word? 

He eateth o' its flesh and casts but bone, 

While hearts o' Earth are woed. 

How doth the Man-man greed? 
He eateth o' the store, yet holdeth ope 
His hands and scattereth o' bread 
And hearts o' Earth are fed. 

This then abe, and yet will be 

Since time and time, and beeth ever." 

As soon as this was read, she followed with 
another song: 

Drink ye unto me. 

Drink ye deep, to me. 

Yea, and seek ye o' the Brew ye quaff, 

For this do I to beg. 

Seek not the wine o' Summer's sun. 

That hid 'mid purpled vine. 

And showeth there amid the Brew 

Thou suppest as the Wine. 

Seek not the drops o' pool, 

Awarmed aneath the sun. 

And idly lapping at the brink 

Of mosses' lips, to sup. 



CONVERSATIONS 181 

Seek not o' vintage Earth doth hold. 
Nay, unto thee this plea shall wake 
The Wine that thou shouldst quaff. 
For at the loving o' this heart 
The Wine o' Love shall flow. 
Then drink ye deep, ah, drink ye deep, 
And drink ye deep o' Love. 

" Yea, thine unto me, and mine to thee." 

After which she explained : 

" I did to fashion out a brew for her ayonder 
and him ahere. And they did eat o' it. Yea, 
for they know o' Him and know o' the work- 
ings o' Him and drinked o' the love o' me as 
the love o' Him. Yea, and hark, there abe 
much athin this pack for thee." 

This, it will be observed, is rather a discourse 
than a conversation, and it is often so, Patience 
filling the evening with her own words ; not as 
exclusively so, however, as this would indicate : 
for there is always more or less conversation 
among the party, which it would profit nothing 
to reproduce. 



182 PATIENCE WORTH 

The next sitting is somewhat more varied. 
There were present Dr. X., a teacher of anat- 
omy, Mrs. X., Mrs. W. and Miss B. Dr. X. 
sat at the board with Mrs. Curran : 

Patience, — " Eh, gad! Here be a one who 
taketh Truth unto him and setteth the good 
dame apace that she knoweth not the name o' 
her. I tell thee 'tis he who knoweth her as a 
sister, and telleth much o' her, and naught he 
speaketh oft holdeth her, and much he speak- 
eth holdeth little o' her, and yet ever he holdeth 
her unto him. He taketh me as truth, yea, he 
knoweth he taketh naught and buildeth much, 
and much and buildeth little o' it. I track me 
unto the door o' him and knock and he heareth 



me." 



This, of course, refen^ed to Dr. X. and his 
work, and it aroused some discussion, after 
which Patience asked, " Would ye I sing? " 
The answer being in the affirmative, she gave 
this little verse, also directed to Dr. X. : 

Out 'pon the sea o' learning, 
rioateth the barque o' one aseek. 



CONVERSATIONS 183 

Out 'pon troubled waters floateth the craft, 
Abuilded staunch o' beams o' truth. 
And though the waves do beat them high 
And wash o'er and o'er the prow, 
Fear thee not, for Truth saileth on. 
Set thy beacon, then, to crafts not thine, 
For thou hast a light for man. 

** There, thou knowest me. I tell thee I 
speak unto him who hath truth for his very 
own. Set thee aweave." 

The sitters complied and received about six 
hundred words of the story, after which Mrs. 
X. took the board, remarking as she did so that 
she was afraid, which elicited this observation 
from Patience : 

" She setteth aside the stream and seeth the 
craft afloat and be at wishing for to sail, and 
yet she would to see her who steereth." 

Mrs. X. gave up her place to Miss B., a 
teacher of botany, to whom Patience presented 
this tribute: 

" The eye o' her seeth but beauties and shut- 
teth up that which showeth darked, that that 



184. PATIENCE WORTH 

not o' beautie setteth not within the see o' her. 
Yea, more ; she knoweth how 'tis the dark and 
what showeth not o' beauty, at His touching 
showeth lovely for the see o' her. 

" Such an heart! Ah, thou shouldst feast 
hereon. I tell thee she giveth unto multitudes 
the heart o' her; and such as she dealeth unto 
earth, earth has need for much. She feasteth 
her 'pon dusts and knoweth dust shall spring 
forth bloom. Hurt hath set the heart o' her, 
and she hath packed up the hurt with petals." 

Patience then turned her attentions again to 
Dr. X. " He yonder," she said, " hath much 
aneath his skuU's-cap that he wordeth not." 

Thus urged. Dr. X. inquired : 

" Does Patience prepare the manuscript she 
gives in advance? It rather seems that she 
reads the material to Mrs. Curran." 

" See ye," cried Patience, *' he hath spoke 
a thing that set aneath his skull's-cap ! " And 
then, in answer to his question : 

" She who afashioneth loaf doth shake well 
the grain-dust that husks show not. Then doth 



CONVERSATIONS 185 

she for to brew and stir and mix, else the loaf 
be not afit for eat." 

By grain-dust she means flour or meal, and 
she uses the word brew in its obsolete sense of 
preparation for cooking. The answer may be 
interpreted that she arranges the story in her 
mind before its dictation, and as to her formal 
work she has said many things to indicate that 
such is her method. Dr. X. then asked: 

" Are these stories real happenings? " 

To which Patience replied : 

" Within the land o' here [her land] be 
packed the days o' Earth, and thy day hath 
its sister day ahere, and thy neighbor's day and 
thy neighbor's neighbor's day. And I tell thee, 
didst thou afashion tale thou couldst ne'er 
afashion lie, for all thou hast athin thy day 
that thy put might show from the see o' thee 
hath been; at not thy time, yea, but it hath 
been." 

" Then," asked Dr. X., " should you have 
transmitted through one who spoke another 
language you would have used their tongue? " 

Patience answered: 



186 PATIENCE WORTH 

" I pettiskirt me so that ye know the me of 
me. Yea, and I do to take me o' the store o' 
her that I make me word for thee." 

" Pettiskirt " is a common expression of 
hers to mean dress, in either a literal or a fig- 
urative sense. The answer does not mean that 
she is limited by Mrs. Curran's vocabulary, but 
is an affirmative response to the question. 

The word " put " in the preceding answer 
is one that requires some explanation, for it is 
frequently used by her, and makes some of her 
sayings difficult to understand. She makes it 
convey a number of meanings now obsolete, 
but it usually refers to her writings, her words, 
her sayings. She makes a noun of it, it will be 
noticed, as well as a verb. In the foregoing 
instance it means " tale," and it has a relation 
to the primary meaning of the verb, which is 
to place. The words that are put down be- 
come a " put," and the writer becomes a " put- 
ter." To a lady who told her that she had 
heard a sound like a bell in her ear, and asked 
if it was Patience trying to communicate wdth 
her, she answered dryly: "Think ye I be a 



CONVERSATIONS 187 

tinkler o' brass? Nay. I be a putter o' 
words." Further to illustrate this use of the 
word, and also to throw an interesting light 
upon her method of communication and the 
reason for it, I present here a part of a conver- 
sation in which a Dr. Z. was the interrogator. 

Dr. Z. — " Why isn't there some other means 
you could use more easy to manipulate than 
the ouija board? " 

Patience, — " The hand o' her (Mrs. Curran) 
do I to put (write) be the hand o' her, and 'tis 
ascribe (the act of writing) that setteth the one 
awhither by eyes-fulls she taketh in." 

By this she seems to mean that if Mrs. Cur- 
ran tried to write for Patience with a pen or 
pencil, the act, being always associated with 
conscious thought, would set her consciousness 
to work, and put Patience '' awhither." 

JDr, Z, — " How did you know this avenue 
was open? " 

Patience. — " I did to seek at crannies for to 
put; aye, and 'twer the her o' her who tireth 
past the her o' her, and slippeth to a naught o' 



188 PATIENCE WORTH 

putting; and 'twer the me o' me at seek, aye, 
and find. Aye, and 'twer so." 

At the time Patience first presented herself 
to Mrs. Curran, she (Mrs. Curran) was very 
tired, and was sitting at the board with Mrs. 
Hutchings, with her head, as she expresses it, 
absolutely empty. 

Dr. Z. — " Did you go forth to seek, or were 
you sent? " 

Patience, — ** There be nay tracker o' path 
ne'er put thereon by sender." 

Dr. Z, — " Did you know of the ouija board 
and its use before? " 

Patience, — " Nay, 'tis not the put o' me, the 
word hereon. 'Tis the put o' me at see o' 
her. 

" I put athin the see o' her, aye and 'tis the 
see o' ye that be afuUed o' the put o' me, and 
yet a put thou knowest not. 

" That which ye know not o' thy day hath 
slipped it unto her, and thence unto thee. And 
thee knowest 'tis not the put o' her; aye, and 
thee knowest 'tis ne'er a putter o' thy day there 
be at such an put. Aye, and did he to put, 



CONVERSATIONS 189 

'twould be o' thy day and not the day o' me. 
And yet ye prate o' why and whence and 
where. I tell thee 'tis thee that knowest that 
which ye own not." 
Dr. Z, — " Why don't we own it, Patience? " 
Patience, — " 'Tis at fear o' gab." 
It is no easy task to untangle that putting 
of puts, but, briefly, it seems to mean that Pa- 
tience does not put her words on the board 
direct, with the hands of Mrs. Curran, but 
transmits her words through the mind or inner 
vision of Mrs. Curran, and yet it is the word of 
Patience and not of Mrs. Curran that is re- 
corded. This accords with Mrs. Curran's im- 
pressions. And thou knowest. Patience far- 
ther says, that it is not the language of her, 
and no writer of thy day would or could write 
in such a language as I make use of. 

Returning to Dr. X. and his party. They 
were present again a few days after the inter- 
view just given, having with them a Miss J., 
a newspaper writer from an Ohio city. Dr. X. 
in the meantime had thought much upon the 



190 PATIENCE WORTH 

phenomena, and Patience immediately di- 
rected her guns upon the anatomist, in this 
manner : 

Patience, — " Hark ye, lad, unto thee I do 
speak. Thou hast a sack o' the wares o' me, 
and thou hast eat therefrom. Yea, and thou 
hast spat that which thou did'st eat, and eat it 
o'er. And yet thou art not afulled. 

" Hark! Here be a trick that shall best thee 
at thine own trick. Lo, thou lookest upon flesh 
and it be but flesh. Yea, thou lookest unto thy 
brother, and see but flesh. And yet thy 
brother speakest word, and thou sayest : ' Yea, 
this is a man, aye, the brother o' me.' Then 
doth death lay low thy brother, and he speak 
not word unto thee, thou sayest : ' Nay, this is 
no man; nay, this is but clay.' Then lookest 
thou unto thy brother, and thou seest not the 
him o' him. Thou knowest not the him o' him 
(the soul) but the flesh o' him only. 

" More I tell thee. Thy very babe wert not 
flesh; yea, it were as dead afore the coming. 
Yet, at the mother's bearing, it setteth within 
the flesh. And thou knowest it and speak, yea. 



CONVERSATIONS 191 

this is a man. And yet I tell thee thou know- 
est not e'en the him o' him! Then doth it die, 
'tis nay man, thou sayest. Yet, at the dying 
and afore the bearing, 'twer what? The him 
o' him wert then, and now, and ever. 

" Yea, I speak unto thee not through flesh, 
and thou sayest : This is no man, yea, for thine 
eyes see not flesh, yet thou knowest the me o' 
me, and I speak unto thee with the me o' me. 
And thou art where upon thy path o' learn- 
ing!" 

There was some discussion following this 
argument in which Dr. X. admitted that he 
accepted only material facts and believed but 
what he saw. 

Patience, — " Man maketh temples that reach 
them unto the skies, and yet He fashioneth a 
gnat, and where be man's learning! 

" The earth is full o' what the blind in-man 
seeth not. Ope thine eye, lad. Thou art 
athin dark, and yet drink ye ever o' the 
light." 

Dr, X, — " That's all right, Patience, and a 



192 PATIENCE WORTH 

good argument; but tell me where the him o' 
him of my dbg is." 

Patience. — " Thou art ahungered for what 
be thine at the hand o' thee. Thy dog hath far 
more o' Him than thy brothers who set them 
as dogs and eat o' dog's eat. The One o' One, 
the All o' All, yea, all o' life holdeth the Him 
o' Him, thy Sire and mine ! 'Tis the breath o' 
Him that pulses earth. Thou asketh where 
abides this thing. Aneath thy skull's arch there 
be nay room for the there or where o' this! " 

Miss J. then took the board and Patience 
said : 

" She taketh it she standeth well athin the 
sight o' me that she weareth the frock o' me." 

This caused a laugh, for it was then ex- 
plained by the visitors that Miss J. had chosen 
to wear a frock somewhat on the Puritan 
order, having a gray cape with white cuffs and 
collar, and had said she thought Patience 
would approve of it. 

Patience. — " Here be a one aheart ope, and 
she hath the in-man who she proddeth that he 



CONVERSATIONS 193 

opeth his eyes. Yea, she seest that which be 
and thou seest not." 

It was remarked that Patience was evidently 
trying to be very nice to Miss J. 

Patience. — " Nay, here be a one who tickleth 
with quill, I did hear ye put. Think ye not a 
one who putteth as me, be not a love o' me? 
Yea, she be. And I tell thee a something that 
she will tell unto ye is true. Oft hath she 
sought for word that she might put, and lo, 
from whence she knoweth not it cometh." 

Miss J. said this was true. 

Patience. — " Shall I then sing unto thee, 
wench? " 

Miss J. expressed delight, and the song fol- 
lowed. 

Ah, how do I to build me up my song for thee? 
Yea, and tell unto thee of Him. 
I'd shew unto thee His loving-, 
I'd shew unto thee His very face. 
Do then to list to this my song. 

Early hours, strip o' thy pure, 
For 'tis the heart of Him. 



194j patience worth 

Earth, breathe deep thy busom, 
Yea, and rock the sea, 
For 'tis the breath of Him. 
Fields, burst ope thy sod. 
And fling thee loose thy store. 
For 'tis the robe of Him. 
Skies, shed thou thy blue, 
The depth of heaven, 
For 'tis the eyes of Him. 
Winter's white, stand thou thick 
And shed thy soft o'er earth. 
For 'tis the touch of Him. 
Spring, shed thou thy loosened 
Laughter of the streams, 
For 'tis the voice of Him. 
Noon's heat, and tire o' earth. 
Shed thou of rest to His, 
For 'tis the rest of Him. 
Evil days of earth. 
Stride thou on and smite. 
For 'tis the frown of Him. 

Earth, this, the chant o' me. 

May end, as doth the works o' man. 

But hark ye ; Earth holdeth all 

That hath been; 

And Spring's ope, and sowing 

O' the Winter's tide. 



CONVERSATIONS 196 

Shall bear the Summer's full 
Of that that be no more. 

For, at the waking o' the Spring, 
The wraiths o' blooms agone 
Shall rise them up from out the mould 
And speak to thee of Him. 

Thus, the songs o' me, 
The works o' thee, 
The Earth's own bloom. 
Are HIM. 

The interest of Dr. X. in this phenomenon 
brought an eminent psychologist, associated 
with one of the greatest state universities in 
the country, some distance from Missouri, for 
an interview with Patience. He shall be known 
here as Dr. V. With him and Dr. X. was Dr. 
K., a physician. Dr. V. sat at the board first, 
and Patience said to him: 

" Here be a one, verily, that hath a sword. 
Aye, and he doth to wrap it o'er o' silks. Yea, 
but I do say unto thee, he doth set the cups o' 
measure at aright, and doth set not the word 
o' me as her ahere (Mrs. Curran) . Nay, not 
till he hath seen and tasted o' the loaf o' me; 



196 PATIENCE WORTH 

and e'en athen he would to take o' the loaf and 
crumb o' it to bits and look unto the crumb 
and wag much afore he putteth. And he wilt 
be assured o' the truth afore the putting." 

This was discussed as a character dehnea- 
tion. 

Patience, — " I'd set at reasoning. Since the 
townsmen do fetch aforth for the seek o' me, 
and pry aneath the me o' me, then do thou 
alike. Yea, put thou unto me." 

Dr, r.— " Why fear Death? " 

Patience, — " Thou shouldst eat o' the loaf 
(her writings) . Ayea, 'tis right and meet that 
flesh shrinketh at the lash." 

Dr. V. was told of her poems on the fear of 
death. 

Dr, V, — " What do you think of the at- 
tempts to investigate you? Is it right? " 

Patience, — " Ayea. And thou hast o' me 
the loaf o' the me o' me, and thou hast o' it 
afar more than thou hast o' thy brother o' 
earth, and yet they seek o' me and seek ever." 

Dr. V, — " Have you ever lived? " 

Patience, — "What! Think ye that I be a 



CONVERSATIONS 197 

prater o' thy path and ne'er atrod? Then 
thou art afoUied, for canst thou tell o' here? " 

Dr. V, — " When did you live on earth? " 

Patience. — " A seed aplanted be watched 
for grow. Ayea, but the seed held athin the 
palm be but a seed, and Earth hath seeds not 
aplanted that she casteth forth, e'en as she 
would to cast forth me, do I not to cloak me 
much." 

Dr. V. — '' I understand ; but can you not 
answer a little clearer the question I put? " 

Patience. — " The time be not ariped for the 
put o' this." 

Dr. V. — " What does Lethe mean? " 

Patience. — "This be a tracker! Ayea, 'tis 
nay a word o' thy day or yet the word o' thy 
brother, that meaneth unto me. I be a maker 
o' loaf for the hungered. Eat thou. 'Tis not 
aright that thou shouldst set unto the feast 
athout thou art fed." 

By this she seemed to mean that she wanted 
him to read her writings and see what it is she 
is endeavoring to do. She continued : 

" Brother, this be not a trapping o' thy 



198 PATIENCE WORTH 

sword, the seeking o' me. Nay, 'tis ahind a 
cloak I do for to stand, that this word abe, and 
not me." 

Mr. CuiTan here stated that this had ever 
been so ; that Patience had obscured herself so 
that her message could not be clouded. 

Patience, — " Aright. I do sing. 

Gone ! Gone ! Ayea, thou art gone ! 
Gone, and earth doth stand it stark. 
Gone ! Gone ! The even's breath 
Doth breathe it unto me 
In echo soft; yea, but sharped, 
And cutting o' this heart. 

Gone ! Gone ! Aye, thou art gone ! 

The day is darked, and sun 

Hath sorried sore and wrapped him in the dark. 

Gone ! Gone ! This heart doth drip o' drops 

With sorry singing o' this song. 

Gone! Gone I Yea, thou art gone! 

And where, beloved, where? 

Doth yonder golden shaft o' light 

That pierceth o' the cloud 

Then speak unto this heart? 

Art thou athin the day's dark hours? 



CONVERSATIONS 199 

Hast thou then hid from sight o' me, 
And yet do know mine hour ? 

Gone ! Gone ! What then hath Earth? 
What then doth day to bring 
To this the sorry-laden heart o' me, 
That weepeth blood drops here? 

Gone ! Gone ! Yea, but hark ! 

For I did trick the sorry, loved ; 

For where e'er thou art am I. 

Yea, this love o' me shall follow thee 

Unto the Where, and thou shalt ever know 

That though this sorry setteth me 

I be where'er thou art." 

After this Dr. K., who resides in St. Louis, 
took the board. 

Patience, — " Here abe a townsman. Aye, 
a Sirrah who knoweth men and atruth doth 
ne'er acloak the blade o' him as doth brother 
ayonder. Ayea, ahind a chuckle beeth fires. 

" There abe weave 'pon the cloth o' me, yea, 
but 'tis nay ariped the time that I do weave. 
Yea, thou hast a pack o' tricks. Show unto 
me, then, thine." 

Here Dr. V. asked: "Do you know Dr. 
James? " 



mo PATIENCE WORTH 

This referred to the late Dr. William James, 
the celebrated psychologist of Harvard. 

Patience, — " I telled a one o' the brothers 
and the neighbors o' thy day, and he doth 
know." 

She had given such an answer to a frequent 
visitor who had inquired as to her knowledge 
of several eminent men long since dead. It 
was considered an affirmative answer. 

Dr, V. — " Have you associated with Dr. 
James? " 

Patience, — " Hark ! Unto thee I do say 
athis; 'tis the day's break and Earth shall 
know, e'en athin thy day, much o' the Here. 

" This, the brother o' ye, the seeker o' the 
Here, hath set a promise so, and 'tis for to be, 
I say unto thee. Thou knowest 'tis the word 
o' him spaked in loving. Yea, for such a man 
as the man o' him wert, standeth as a beacon 
unto the Here." 

Dr. V, — " Could Dr. James, by seeking as 
you did, communicate with someone here as 
you are doing? " 

Patience,—'' This abe so ; he who seeketh abe 



CONVERSATIONS 201 

alike unto thee and thee. Ayea, thee and thy 
brother do set forth with quill, and thou dost 
set aslant, and with thy hand at the right o' 
thee. And thy brother doth trace with the 
hand at the left of him. And 'tis so, thou put- 
test not as him. This, the quill o' me, be for 
the put o' me, and doth he seek and know the 
trick o' tricks o' sending out a music with the 
quill o' me, it might then be so." 

This was interpreted as meaning that if Dr. 
James could find one who had the conditions 
surrounding Mrs. Curran, and was able to 
master the rhythm which Patience uses to give 
the matter to her, then he could do it. 

When the record of the foregoing interview 
was being copied, Mrs. Curran felt an impulse 
to write. Taking the board. Patience indicated 
that she had called, and at once set forth, ap- 
parently for Dr. v., the following explanation 
of her method of communication and the prin- 
ciple upon which it is based : 

Patience, — " Aye, 'tis a tickle I be. Hark, 
there be a pulse — Nay, she (Mrs. Curran) 
putteth o' the word! Alist. — There abe a 



202 PATIENCE WORTH 

throb; yea, the songs o' Earth each do throb 
them, like unto the throbbing o' the heart that 
beareth them. Yea, and there be a kinsman o' 
the heart that beareth them. Yea, and there 
be a kinsman o' thee who throbbeth as dost 
thou. Yea, and he knoweth thee as doth nay 
brother o' thee whose throb be not as thine. 
So 'tis, the drop that f alleth athin the sea, doth 
sound out a silvered note that no man heareth. 
Yet its brother drops and the drop o' it do to 
make o' the sea's voice. Aye, and the throb o' 
the sea be the throb o' it. So, doth thy brother 
seek out that he make word unto thee from the 
Here, he then falleth aweary. For thee of 
Earth do hark not unto the throb. And be the 
one aseeked not attuned unto the throb o' him 
he findeth, 'tis nay music. So 'tis, what be the 
throb o' me and the throb o' her ahere, be nay 
a throb o' music's weave for him aseek. 

" I tell thee more. The throb hath come 
unto thy day long and long. Yea, they be 
afuUed o' throb, and yet nay man taketh up 
the throbbing as doth the sea. The drop o' me 
did seek and find, and throb met throb o' 



CONVERSATIONS 203 

loving. Yea, and even as doth the sea to 
throb out the silvered note o' drop, even so 
doth she to throb out the love o' me." 

This seems, in effect, a declaration that com- 
munications of this character are a matter of 
attunement, possible only between two natures 
of identical vibrations, one seeking and the 
other receptive. It indicates too that her 
rhythmical speech has an influence upon 
the facility of her utterances. At another 
time she described her own seeking in this 
verse : 

How have I sought I 

Yea, how have I asought, 

And seeked me ever through the earth's hours, 

Amid the damp, cool moon, when winged scrape 

Doth sound and cry unto the day 

The waking o' the hosts ! 

Yea, and 'mid the noon's heat, 

When Earth doth wither 'neath the sun, 

And rose doth droop from sun's-kiss, 

That stole the dew ; and 'mid the wastes 

O' water where they whirl and rage, 

And seeked o' word that I 

Might put to answer thee. 



20^ PATIENCE WORTH 

Ayea, from days have I then stripped 

The fulness of their joys, and pryed 

The very buds that they might ope for thee. 

Aye, and sought the days apast, 

That I might sing them unto thee. 

And ever, ever, cometh unto me 

Thy song o' why? why? why? 

And then, lo, I found athin this heart 

The answer to thy song. 

Aye, it chanteth sweet unto this ear, 

And fillet h up the song. 

Do hark thee, hark unto the song. 

For answer to thy why ? why ? why ? 

I sing me Give ! Give ! Give ! 

Aye, ever Give! 

When the foregoing verse was received, Dr. 
X. was again present, this time with his wife 
and two physicians. Dr. R. and Dr. P. It will 
have been observed that many doctors of many 
kinds have " sat at the feet " of Patience 
Worth, but all, as I have said, have come as 
the friends of friends of Mrs. Curran, upon 
her invitation, or upon that of Mr. Curran. 
On this occasion Patience began: 

" They do seek o' me, ever; that they do 



CONVERSATIONS 205 

see the pettiskirt o' me, and eat not o' the loaf ! 
(More interested in the phenomenon than the 
words.) Ayea, but he ahere (Dr. R.) hath a 
wise pate. Aye, he seeketh, and deep athin the 
heart o' him sinketh seed o' the word o' me. 
Aye, even though he doth see the me o' mjg 
athrough the sage's eye o' him, still shall he 
to love the word o' me." 

After due acknowledgments from Dr. R., 
she continued: 

" Yea, brother, hark unto the word o' me, 
for thou dost seek amid the fields o' Him! 
Aye, and 'tis, thou knowest, earth's men that 
be afar amore awry athin the in-man than in 
the flesh. And 'tis the in-man o' men thou 
knowest." 

Dr. R., a neurologist, gave hearty assent. 

" Put thou unto me. (Question me.) 'Tis 
awish I be that ye weave." 

Dr. R, — " Do you see through Mrs. Cur- 
ran's eyes and hear through her ears?" 

Patience. — " Even as thou hast spoke, it be. 
Aye, and yet I say me 'tis the me o' me that 
knoweth much she heareth and seeth not." 



206 PATIENCE WORTH 

Then to a question had she ever talked be- 
fore with anyone, she said; " Anaught save the 
flesh o' me." 

" Fetch ye the wheel," she commanded, 
" that I do sit and spin." 

This was one of her ways of saying that she 
desired to write on her story, and she dictated 
several hundred words of it, after which Dr. P. 
took the board and she said : 

" What abe ahere? A one who seeth sorry 
and maketh merry! Yea, a one who leaveth 
the right hand o' him unto its task, and setteth 
his left at doing awry o' the task o' its brothers. 
Aye, he doeth the labors o' his brother, aye, 
and him. Do then, aweave." 

In compliance some more of the story was 
written, and then Dr. R. " wondered " why he 
could not write for Patience, to which she an- 
swered : 

" Hark unto me, thou aside. Thou shalt 
put (say) 'tis her ahere (i,e,, Mrs. Curran, who 
does it) ; ayea, and say much o' word, and e'en 
set down athin thy heart thy word o' what I 
be, and yet I tell thee, I be me! Aye, ever, 



CONVERSATIONS 207 

and the word o' me shall stand, e'en when thou 
and thou art ne'er ahere ! 

" E'en he who doth know not o' the Here 
hath felt the tickle o' my word, and seeketh 
much this hearth. 

" Then eat thee well and fill thee up, and 
drink not o' the brew o' me and spat forth the 
sup. Nay, fill up thy paunch. 'Twill merry 
thee!" 

Dr. P. asked her a question about her looks. 

" 'Tis a piddle he putteth," she said. 

And now we come to a sitting of a lighter 
character. There were present at this Dr. and 
Mrs. D., Mr. and Mrs. M. and Mrs. and 
Miss G. 

" Aflurry I be! " cried Patience. " Aye, for 
the pack o' me be afuUed o' song and weave, 
and e'en word to them ahere. 

" Yea, but afirst there be a weave, for the 
thrift-bite eateth o' me." (The bite of her 
thrifty nature.) 

Some of the story followed and then she said 
to Mrs. M., who sat at the board: 



208 PATIENCE WORTH 

" Here be aone who doth to lift up the lid 
o' the brew's pot, that she see athin! Aye, 
Dame, there abe but sweets athin the brew for 
thee. Amore, for e'en tho' I do brew o' sweets 
and tell unto thee, I be a dealer o' sours do I 
to choose ! Ayea, and did I to put the spatting 
o' thee athin the brew, aye verily 'twould be 
asoured a bit! " Then deprecatingly : " 'Tis a 
piddle I put! 

" Yea, for him aside who sitteth that he 
drink o' this brew do I to sing; fetch thee 
aside, thee the trickster o' thy day! " 

There being so many " tricksters " in the 
room, they were at a loss to know which one 
she meant. Mr. C. asked if she meant Dr. D., 
but Patience said: 

" Thinkest thou he who setteth astraight the 
wry doth piddle o' a song? Anay, to him who 
musics do I to sing." 

This referred to Mr. G., who is a musician 
and a composer, and he took the board. Pa- 
tience at once gave him this song : 

Nodding, nodding, 'pon thy stem, 
Thou bloom o' morn, 



CONVERSATIONS 209 

Nodding, nodding to the bees, 

Asearch o' honey's sweet. 

Wilt thou to droop and wilt the dance o' thee, 

To vanish with the going o' the day? 

Hath the tearing o' the air o' thy sharped thorn 

Sent musics up unto the bright, 

Or doth thy dance to mean anaught 

Save breeze-kiss 'pon thy bloom? 

Hath yonder songster harked to thee, 

And doth he sing thy love? 

Or hath he tuned his song of world's wailing o' the 

day? 
Doth morn shew thee naught save thy garden's wall 
That shutteth thee away, a treasure o' thy day? 
Doth yonder hum then spell anaught, 
Save whirring o' the wing that hovereth 
O'er thy bud to sup the sweet? 

Ah, garden's deep, afulled o' fairies' word, 
And creeped o'er with winged mites, 
Where but the raindrops' patter telleth thee His love — 
Doth all this vanish then, at closing o' the day? 
Anay. For He hath made a one who seeketh here. 
And storeth drops, and song, and hum, and sweets, 
And of these weaveth garland for the earth. 
From off his lute doth drip the day of Him. 



210 PATIENCE WORTH 

Patience then turned her attention to Mr. 
M., saying: 

" Ayea, he standeth afar from the feasting 
place and doth to smack him much ! " 

Mr. M. took the board, and she began to 
talk to him in an intimate way about the vary- 
ing attitudes of people toward her and her 
work, and what they say of her: 

" I be a dame atruth," she said, " and I tell 
thee the word o' wag that shall set thy day, 
meaneth anaught but merry to me. Hark! I 
put a murmur o' thy day, for at the supping o' 
this cup the earth shall murmur so: 

" 'Tis but the chatter o' a wag! Aye, the 
putting o' the mad! 'Tis piddle! Yea, the 
trapping o' a fool ! Yea, 'tis but the dreaming 
o' the waked! Aye, the word o' a wicked 
sprite! Yea, and telleth naught and putteth 
naught ! 

" And yet, do barken unto me. They then 
shall seek to taste the brew and sniff the whiff- 
ing o' the scent; ayea, and stop alonger that 
they feast ! And lo, 'twill set some asoured, and 
some asweet; aye and some, ato (too), shall 



CONVERSATIONS 211 

fill them upon the words THEY do to put o' 
me, and find them filled o' their own put, and 
lack the room for eat o' the loaf o' me. 'Tis 
piddle, then! Aye, and yet I say me so, 'tis 
bread, and bread be eat though it be but spar- 
rows that do seek the crumb. Then what care 
ye? For bake asurely shall be eat! " 

This is a point she often makes, and strives 
earnestly to impress — that whatever she may 
be, whatever the world may think she is, there 
is substance in her words. It is bread, and 
will be eaten, if only by the sparrows. So, she 
is content. She has put this thought, some- 
what pathetically, into the little verse which 
follows : 

Loth as Night to dark o' Day, 

Loth do I to sing. 

Aye, but doth the Day aneed a song, 

'Tis they, o' Him, 

The songsters o' the Earth, 

Do sing them on, to Him. 

What though 'tis asmiled? And what 

Though 'tis nay aseeked o' such a song? 

Aye, what though 'tis sung 'mid dark? 



212 PATIENCE WORTH 

'Tis I would sing, 

Do thee to list, or nay. 

"I be a dame who knoweth o' the hearth. 
Aye, and do to know o' the hearts o' men," she 
said to Mrs. D., who next took the place with 
Mrs. Curran. " Ayea, and do to put o' that 
athin the hearts o' them that doth tickle o' their 
merry! This be a tale for her ahere." 

The Story of the Herbs 

" Lo, there wert a dame and her neighbor's 
dame and her neighbor's dame. And they did 
to plant them o' their gardens full. And lo, 
at a day did come unto the garden's ope a 
stranger, who bore him of a bloom-topped 
herb. And lo, he spaked unto the dame who 
stood athin the sun-niche that lay at the gar- 
den's end, and he did tell unto her of the herb 
he bore. And lo, he told that he would give 
unto her one of these, and to her neighbor 
dame a one, atoo (also), and to her neighbor 
dame a one atoo, and he then would leave the 



CONVERSATIONS S15 

garden's place and come at the fulling o' the 
season-tide when winter's bite did sear, and 
that he then would seek them out, and they 
should shew unto him the fulling o' the herb. 

" And lo, he went him out unto the neigh- 
bor's dame and telled unto her the same, and 
to her neighbor's dame the same, and they did 
seek one the other and tell o' all the stranger 
had told unto them. And each had sorry, for 
feared 'twer the cunger o' the wise men, and 
each aspoke her that she would to care and 
care for this the herb he did to leave, and that 
she would have at the fulling o' the season the 
herb that stood at the fullest bloom. And each 
o' the dames did speak it that this herb o' her 
should be the one waxed stronger at the full- 
ing. And lo, none told unto the other o' how 
this would to be. 

" And lo, the first o' dames did plant her 
herb adeep and speak little, and lo, her neigh- 
bor dames did word much o' the planting, and 
carried drops from out the well that the herbs 
might full. And lo, they did pluck o' the first 
bud that them that did follow should be 



214 PATIENCE WORTH 

afuUer. And lo, the dame afirst o' the garden 
the stranger did to seek, did look with sunked 
heart at the thriving o' the herbs o' the neigh- 
bor dames. And lo, she wept thereon, and 
'twer that her well did dry, and yet she seeked 
not the wells of her sisters. Nay, but did weep 
upon the earth about the herb, and lo, it did 
to spring it up. And lo, she looked not with 
greed upon her sister's herb; nay, for at the 
caring for the bloom, lo, she loved its bud and 
wept that she had nay drop to give as drink 
unto it. 

" And lo, at a certain day the stranger came 
and did seek the dames, and came him unto 
her garden where the herb did stand, and he 
bore the herbs of her sisters, and they wert tall 
and full grown and filled o' bloom. And he 
did to put the herb o' her sisters anext the herb 
o' her, and lo, the herb o' her did spring it up, 
and them o' her sisters shrunked to but a twig. 
And he did call unto the dames and spake : 

" ' Lo, have ye but fed thy herb that it be 
full o' bloom, that thou shouldst glad thee o'er 
thy sister? And lo, the herb o' her hath 



CONVERSATIONS 215 

drunked her tears shed o' loving, and standeth 
sweet-bloomed from out the tears o' her.' 

" And lo, the herb did flower aneath their 
very eyes. And lo, the flowering wert fulled 
o' dews-gleam, and 'twer the sweet o' her heart, 
yea, the dew o' heaven." 

Following this pretty parable someone 
spoke of a newspaper article that had appeared 
that day, and Patience remarked: 

" 'Tis a gab o' fool. Aye, and the gab o' 
fool be like unto a spring that be o'erfuU o' 
drops, 'tis ne'er atelling when it breaketh out 
its bounds." 

With this sage observation she dismissed the 
" fool " as unworthy of further consideration, 
and gave this poem: 

Do I to love the morn, 

When Earth awakes, and streams 

Aglint o' sun's first gold, 

As siren's tresses thred them through the fields ; 

When sky-cup gleameth as a pearl; 

When sky-hosts wake, and leaf bowers 

Wave aheavied with the dew.'' 



216 PATIENCE WORTH 

Do I to love the eve, 

When white the moon doth show, 

And frost's sweet sister, young night's breath, 

Doth stand aglistened 'pon the blades; 

When dark the shadow deepeth. 

Like to the days agone that stand 

As wraiths adraped o' black 

Along the garden's path ; 

When sweet the nestlings twitter 

'Neath the wing of soft and down 

That hovereth it there within 

The shadows deep atop the tree? 



Do I to love the mid-hours deep — 
The royal color o' the night ? 
For earth doth drape her purpled. 
And jeweled o'er athin this hour. 

Do I to love these hours, then, 
As the loved o' me? 
Nay, for at the mom, 
Lo, do I to love the evet 
And at the eve, 
Lo, do I to love the mom ! 
And at the morn and eve, 
'Tis night that claimeth me. 



CONVERSATIONS 217 

A little of the reasoning of Patience upon 
Earth questions may appropriately come in 
here. The Currans, with a single visitor, had 
talked at luncheon of various things, begin- 
ning with music and ending with capital pun- 
ishment, the latter suggested by an execution 
which at the moment was attracting national 
attention. When they took the board, after 
luncheon. Patience said: 

" List thee. Earth sendeth up much note* 
Yea, and some do sound them at wry o' melody, 
and others sing them true. And lo, they who 
sing awry shall mingle much and drown in 
melody. And I tell thee, o'er and above shall 
sound the note o' me! " 

And then she gave them to understand that 
she had listened to their discussion! 

" Ye spake ye of eye for eye. Yea, and 
tooth for tooth. Yea, but be thy brother's 
eye not the ope o' thine, then 'tis a measure 
less the full thou hast at taking o' the eye o' 
him. Yea, and should the tooth o' him put 
crave for carrion, and thine for sweets, then 
how doth the tooth o' him serve thee? " 



218 PATIENCE WORTH 

Here the sitters asked: " How about a life 
for a life. Patience? " 

Patience. — " Ye fill thy measure full o' sands 
that trickle waste at each and every putting. 
I tell thee thou hast claimed life; aye, and 
life be not thine or yet thy brother's for the 
taking or giving. Yea, and such an soul hath 
purged at the taking or giving, and rises to 
smile at thy folly. 

"Aye, and more. List! The earth's bag- 
gage, hate, and might, and scorn, fall at earth's 
leave, a dust o' naught, like the dust o' thy 
body crumbleth. 

" Thou canst strip the body, yea, but the 
soul defieth thee ! " 

The visitor referred to in the preceding talk 
is a frequent guest of the Currans, and is one 
of the loved ones of Patience. This visitor, 
who is a widow, remarked one evening that 
Patience was deep and lived in a deep 
place. 

" Aye," said Patience, " a deeper than word. 
There be ahere what thou knowest abetter far 



CONVERSATIONS 219 

than word o' me might tell. (This seems to 
refer to the visitor's husband.) Ayea thou 
hungereth, and bread be thine, for from off 
lips that spaked not o' the land o' here in word 
o' little weight, thou hast supped of love, and 
know the path that be atrod by him shall be 
atrod even so by thee, e'en tho' thou shouldst 
find the mountain's height and pits o' depth 
past Earth's tung. 

" Shouldst thou at come o' here to hark unto 
the sound of this voice, thinkest thou that 
heights, aye or depths, might keep thee from 
there? And even so, doth not the one thou 
seeketh too, haste e'en now to find the path 
and waiteth? 

" Then thinkest thou this journey be lone? 
Nay, I tell thee, thou art areach e'en past the 
ye o' ye, and he areach ato. Then shall the 
path's ope be its end and beginning. In love 
is the end and beginning of things. 

" Yea, yea, yea, the earth suppetH o' the 
word o' me, and e'en at the supping stoppeth 
and speaketh so. What that one not o' me 
doth brew. Thou knowest this, dame. Aye, 



220 PATIENCE WORTH 

but what then? And why doth not the blood 
o' me speak unto me? 

*' 'Tis a merry I be. Lo, have I not fetched 
forth unto a day that holdeth Httle o' the blood 
o' me, that I might deal alike unto my brother 
and bring forth word that be ahungered for 
aye, and they speak them o' her ahere and wag 
and hark not? Yea, and did the blood o' them 
spake out unto their very ears I vow me 
'twould set the earth ariot o' fearing. Yea, 
man loveth blood that hath not flowed, but 
sicketh o'er spilled blood. Yea, then weave." 

There was some discussion following this, to 
the effect that whatever explanations might be 
given of this phenomenon, many would believe 
in Patience Worth as an independent person- 
ality, which brought from her the following 
discourse which may well conclude these con- 
versations : 

" Yea, the tooth o' him who eateth up the 
flesh I did to cloak me athin, shall rot and he 
shalt wither. Aye, and the word o' me shalt 
stand. Fires but bake awell. 



CONVERSATIONS 221 

" Sweet hath the sound of the word o' Him 
asounded unto the ears o' Earth that hark 
not. 

" Yea, and He hath beat upon the busom of 
Earth and sounded out a loud noise, and Earth 
barkened not. 

" And He hath sung thro' the mother's songs 
o' Earth, and Earth barkened not. 

" Yea, and He hath sent His own with word, 
and Earth barkened not. 

" Then 'tis Earth's own folly that batheth 
her. 

" Yea, and Folly cometh astreaming rib- 
bands, and showering color, and grinning 'pon 
his way. 

" Yea, but Folly masketh and leadeth Earth 
and man assuredly unto Follies pit — self. 
And self is blind. 

" Then whence doth Earth to turn for aid? 
For Folly followeth not the blind, and the 
voice of him who f alleth unto the pit of Folly 
soundeth out a loud note. Yea, and it echoeth 
' self.' 

" And lo, the Earth filled up o' self, heark- 



222 PATIENCE WORTH 

eth not unto the words of Him, the King of 
Wisdom. 

" Yea, and I say unto thee, though them o' 
Him fall pierced and rent athin the flow o' 
their own blood thro' the self-song o' his 
brother, he doeth this for Him. 

" And the measuring rod shall weight out 
for him who packeth the least o' self athin 
him, afull o' measure, and light for him who 
packeth heavy o' self. 

" Ayea, and more. I speak me o' lands 
wherein the high estate be self. Yea, yea, yea, 
o' thy lands do I to speak. Woe unto him 
who feareth that might shall slay! Self may 
wield a mighty blow, but it slayeth never. 

" 'Tis as the dame who watcheth o'er her 
brood, and lo, this one hath sorry, and that one 
hath sorry. And she flitteth here and yon, 
and lo, afore she hath fetched out the herbs, 
they sleep them peaceful. So shall it be at 
this time. The herbs shall be fetched forth 
but lo, the lands shall sleep them peaceful. 

" Yea, for Folly leadeth, and Wisdom war- 
reth Folly." 



RELIGION 

" Teach me that I be Ye." 

And now we well may ask: What is the pur- 
pose of all this? Here we appear to have an 
invisible intelligence, speaking an obsolete 
language, producing volumes of poetry con- 
taining many evidences of profound wisdom. 
So far as I have been able to find out, no such 
phenomenon has occurred before since the 
world began. Do not misunderstand that asser- 
tion. There is nothing extraordinary in the 
manner of its coming, as I have said before. 
The publications of the Society for Psychical 
Research are filled with examples of communi- 
cations received in the same or a similar way. 
The fact that makes this phenomenon stand 
out, that altogether isolates it from everything 
else of an occult nature, is the character and 
quality of its literature. Literature is some- 

223 



^24. PATIENCE WORTH 

thing tangible, something that one can lay 
hands on, so to speak. It is in a sense physical ; 
it can be seen with the eyes. And this litera- 
ture is the physical evidence which Patience 
Worth presents of herself as a separate and 
distinct personality. 

But why is it contributed? Is there in it 
any intimation or assertion of a definite piu*- 
pose? 

If we may assume that Patience is what she 
seems to be — a voice from another world, then 
indeed we may discern a purpose. She has a 
message to deliver, and she gives the impres- 
sion that she is a messenger. 

" Do eat that which I offer thee," she says. 
" 'Tis o' Him. I but bear the pack apacked 
for the carry o' me by Him." 

Constantly she speaks of herself as bearing 
food or drink in her words. " I bid thee eat," 
she said to one, " and rest ye, and eat amore, 
for 'tis the wish o' me that ye be filled." The 
seed, the loaf, the cup, are frequently used 
symbolically when referring to her communi- 
cations. 



RELIGION ^25 

" There be a man who buyeth grain and he 
telleth his neighbor and his neighbor's neigh- 
bor, and lo, they come asacked and clamor for 
the grain. And what think ye? Some do 
make price, and yet others bring naught. But 
I be atelling ye, 'tis not a price I beg. Nay, 
'tis that ye drink my cup." 

" 'Tis truth o' earth that 'tis the seed 
aplanted deep that doth cause the harvester for 
to watch. For lo, doth he to hold the seed 
athin (within) his hand, 'tis but a seed. And 
aplanted he doth watch him in wondering. 
Verily do I say, 'tis so with me. I be aplanted 
deep ; do thee then to watch." 

And with greater significance she has ex- 
claimed : " Morn hath broke, and ye be the first 
to see her light. Look ye wide-eyed at His 
workings. He hath offered ye a cup." 

It is thus she announces herself to be a 
herald of a new day, a bearer of tidings 
divinely commissioned. 

What, then, is her message? For answer 
it may be said that it is at once a revelation, a 



226 PATIENCE WORTH 

religion and a promise. Whatever we may 
think of the nature of this phenomenon, Pa- 
tience herself is a revelation, and there are 
many revelations in her words. The religion 
she presents is not a new one. It is as old 
as that given to the world nineteen centuries 
ago; for fundamentally it is the same. It is 
that religion, stripped of all the doctrines and 
creeds and ceremonials and observances that 
have grown up about it in all the ages since 
His coming, and paring it down to the point 
where it can be expressed by the one word — 
Love. Love, going out to fellow man, to all 
nature and overflowing toward God. 

In the consideration of this religion let us 
begin at the beginning, at the ground, so to 
speak, with this expression of love for the love- 
less: 

Ah, could I love thee, 

Thou, the loveless o' the earth, 

And pry aneath the crannies 

Yet untouched by mortal hand 

To send therein this love o' mine — 

Thou creeping mite, and winged speck, 



RELIGION 227 

And whirled waters o' the mid o' sea 

Where no man seeth thee? 

And could I love thee, the days 

Unsunned and laden with hate o' sorry ing? 

Ah, could I love thee. 

Thou who beareth blight; 

And thou the fruit bescorched 

And shrivelling, to fall unheeded 

'Neath thy mother-stalk? 

Ah, could I love thee, love thee? 

Aye, for Him who loveth thee. 

And blightest but through loving; 

Like to him who bendeth low the forest's king 

To fashion out a mast. 

Love for everything is the essence of her 
thought and of her song. And as she thus 
sings for the loveless, so she sings for the 
wearied ones and the failures of the earth: 

I'd sing. 

Wearied word adropped by weary ones, 

And broked mold afashioned out by wearied hands ; 

A falter-song sung through tears o' wearied one; 

A fancied put o' earth's fair scene 

Af alien at awry o' weariness. Love's task 



S28 PATIENCE WORTH 

Unfinished, aye, o'ertaken by sore weariness — 
O' thee I'd sing. 

Aye, and put me such an songed-note 
Tliat earth, aye, and heaven, should hear; 
And thou, aye all o' ye, the soul-songs 
O' my brothers, be afinished, 
At the closing o' my song. 

Aye, and wearied, aye and wearied, I'd sing. 
I'd sing for them, the loved o' Him, 
And brothers o' thee and me. Amen. 

This is the prelude and now comes the song: 

I choose o' the spill 

O' love and word and work, 

The waste o' earth, to build. 

Ye hark unto the sages, 
And oft a way-singer's song 
Hath laden o'erfuU o' truth. 
And wasteth 'pon the air, 
And falleth not unto thine ear. 

Think ye He scattereth whither 
E'en such an grain? Nay. 
And do ye seek o' spiU 



RELIGION 229 

And put unto thy song, 
'Twin fiU its emptiness. 

Ye seek to sing but o' thy song, 
And 'tis an empty strain. 'Tis need 
O' love's spill for to fill. 

The spill of earth, the love that goes un- 
noticed and unappreciated, the words that are 
unheard or unheeded, the work that seems to 
be for naught — none of these is waste. A song 
it is for the wearied ones, the heart-sick and 
discouraged, " the loved of Him and brothers 
of thee and me." 

And yet she calls them waste but to show 
that they are not. " The waste of earth," she 
says, " doth build the Heaven," and this is the 
theme of much of her song. 

Earth hath filled it up o' waste and waste. 

The sea's fair breast, that heaveth as a mother's, 

Beareth waste o' wrecks and wind-blown waste. 

The day doth hold o' waste. 
The smiles that die, that long to break. 
The woes that burden them already broke, 

'Tis waste, ah yea, 'tis waste. 



230 PATIENCE WORTH 

And yet, and yet, at some fair day, 
E'en as the singing thou dost note 
Doth bound from yonder hill's side green 
As echo, yea, the ghost o' thy voice; 
So shall all o' this to sound aback 
Unto the day. 
Of waste, of waste, is heaven builded up. 

It is to the waste of earth that she speaks in 
this message of love and sympathy : 

Ah, emptied heart ! The weary o' the path ! 

How would I to fill ye up o' love! 

I'd tear this lute, that it might whirr 

A song that soothed thy lone, awearied path. 

I'd steal the sun's pale gold. 

And e'en the silvered even's ray, 

To treasure them within this song 

That it be rich for thee. 

From out the wastes o' earth I'd seek 

And catch the woe-tears shed. 

That I might drink them from the cup 

And fill it up with loving. 

From out the hearts afuUed o' love 

Would I to steal the o'er-drip 

And pack the emptied hearts of earth. 

The bread o' love would I to cast 



RELIGION 231 

Unto thy bywayed path, and pluck me 
From the thorned bush that traileth o'er 
The stepping-place, the thorn, that brothers 
O' the flesh o' me might step 'pon path acleared. 
Yea, I'd coax the songsters o' the earth 
To carol thee upon thy ways, 
And fill ye up o' love and love and love. 

And a message of cheer and encouragement 
she gives to those who sorrow, in this: 

" The web o' sorrow weaveth 'bout the days 
o' earth, and 'tis but Folly who plyeth o' the 
bobbin. I tell thee more, the bobbins stick and 
threads o' day- weave go awry. But list ye; 
'tis he who windeth o' his web 'pon smiles and 
shuttleth 'twixt smiles and woe who weaveth 
o' a day afuU and pleantious. And sorrow 
then wilt rift and show a light athrough." 

Smiles amid sorrows. He who windeth of 
his web upon smiles not only rifts his own woes 
but those of others, as she expresses it in this 
verse: 

The smile thou cast today that passed 
Unheeded by the world ; the handclasp 
Of a friend, the touch of baby palms 



aS2 PATIENCE WORTH 

Upon its mother's breast — 

Whither have they flown along the dreary way? 

Mayhap thy smile 
Hath fallen upon a daisy's golden head, 
To shine upon some weary traveler 
Along the dusty road, and cause 
A softening of the hard, hard way. 
Perchance the handclasp strengthened wavering love 
And lodged thee in thy friend's regard. 
And where the dimpled hands caress, 
Will not a well of love spring forth? 
Who knows, but who will tell 
The hiding of these fleeting gifts ! 

And she gives measure to the same thought 
in this: 

Waft ye through the world sunlight ; 
Throw ye to the sparrows grain 
That runneth o'er the heaping measure. 
Scatter flower petals, like the wings 
Of fluttering butterflies, to streak 
The dove-gray day with daisy gold. 
And turn the silver mist to fleece of gold. 
Hath the king a noble who is such 
An wonder-worker? Or hath his jester 
Such a pack of tricks as thine? 



RELIGION ^33 

Both of these last have to do with the hands 
and with the use of the hands in the expression 
of love for others, but in the following poem 
Patience pays a tender and yet somewhat mys- 
tical tribute to the hands themselves, empty 
hands filled with the gifts of Him, the power 
to build and weave and soothe: 

Hands. Hands. The hands o' Earth; 
Abusied at fashioning, Aye, 
And put o' this, aye, and that. 
Hands. Hands upturned at empty. 
Hands. Hands untooled, aye, but builders 
O' the soothe o' Earth. 

Hands. Hands aspread, aye, and sending forth 

That which they do hold — the emptiness. 

Aye, at empty they be, afulled o' the give o' 

Him. 
At put at up, aye, and down, 'tis at weave 
O' cloth o' Him they be. 

Hands. Hands afulled o' work o' Him ; 
Aye, and ever at a spread o' doing in His name. 
Aye, and at put o' weave 
For naught but loving. 



234. PATIENCE WORTH 

There are no doubt such hands on earth, 
many of them " ever at a spread of doing in 
His name," but not often have their work and 
their mission been so beautifully and so fit- 
tingly expressed as in this strange verse which, 
to me at least, grows in wonder at every read- 
ing. And this not so much because of the 
quaintness of the words and the singularity 
of the construction, as for the thought. This, 
however, is characteristic of all of her work. 
There is always more in it than appears upon 
the surface. And yet when one analyzes it, 
one finds that whatever may be the nature or 
the subject of the composition, in nearly every 
instance love is the inspiration. 

The love that she expresses is universal. It 
goes out to nature in all its forms, animate and 
inanimate, lovely and unlovely. It is mani- 
fested in all her references to humanity, from 
the infant to doddering age ; and her composi- 
tions are filled with appeals for the applica- 
tion of love to the relations between man and 
man. But it is when she sings of God that she 
expresses love with the most tender and pas- 



RELIGION 235 

sionate fervency — His love for man, her love 
for Him. " For He knoweth no beginning, no 
ending to loving," she says, " and loveth thee 
and me and me and thee ever and afore ever." 
" Sighing but bringeth up heart's weary; tears 
but wash the days acleansed; hands abusied 
for them not thine do work for Him; prayers 
that fall 'pon but the air and naught, ye deem, 
sing straight unto Him. Close, close doth He 
to cradle His own to Him." She gives poetic 
expression to this divine love in the song which 
follows : 

Brother, weary o' the plod, 

Art sorried sore o' waiting? 

Brother, bowed aneath the pack o' Earth, 

Art seeking o' the path 

That leadest thee unto new fields 

O' green, and breeze-kissed airs? 

Art bowed and bent o' weight o' sorry? 

Art weary, weary, sore? 

Then come and hark unto this song o' Him. 

Hast thou atrodden 'pon the Earth, 
And worn the paths o' folly 



256 PATIENCE WORTH 

Till thou art foot-sore? 

And hast the day grinned back to thee, 

A foUj-mask adown thy path 

That layeth far behind thee? 

Thy heart, my brother, hast thou then 

Alost it 'pon the path? 

And filled thee up o' word and tung 

O' foUysingers long the way? 

Ah, weary me, ah, weary me ! 
Come thou unto this breast. 
For though thou hast suffered o' the Earth, 
And though thy robe be stained 
O' travel o'er the stoney way. 
And though thy lips deny thy heart, 
Come thou unto this breast, 
The breast o' Him. 
For He knoweth not the stain. 
Aye, and the land o' Him doth know 
No stranger 'mid its hosts. 
Ayea, and though thou comest mute. 
This silence speaketh then to Him, 
And He doth hold Him ope His arms. 

So come thou brother, weary one. 
To Him, for 'tis but Earth and men 
Who ask thee WHY. 



RELIGION ^37 

She pours out her love for Gk)d in many 
verses of praise and prayer. 

Bird skimming to the south, 

Bear thou my song, 
Sand slipping to the wave's embrace. 

Do thou but bear it too 1 
And, shifting tide, take thou 

Unto thy varied paths 
The voicing of my soul! 

I'd build me such an endless 

Chant to sing of Him 
That days to follow days 

Would be but builded chord 
Of this my lay. 

Still more ardently does she express her love 
in these lines : 

Spring, thou art but His smile 

Of happiness in me, and sullen days 

Of weariness shall fall when Spring is bom 

In winds of March and rains of April's tears. 

Methinks 'tis weariness of His that I, 

His loved, should tarry o'er the task 



238 PATIENCE WORTH 

And leave life's golden sheaves unbound. 

And, Night, thou too art mine, of Him. 

Thy dim and veiled stars are but the eyes 

Of Him that through the curtained mystery 

Watch on and sever dark from me. 

And, Love, thou too art His, 

His words of wooing to my soul. 

Should I, then, crush thee in embrace, 

And bruise thee with my kiss, 

And drink thy soul through mine? 

What, then ! 'Tis He, 'tis He, my love. 

That gave me thee, and while my love is thine, 

What wonder is it causeth here 

This heart of mine to stifle so 

And seek expression in a prayer of thanks .'^ 

With equal fervency of devotion and grati- 
tude she sings this tribute to the day : 

Ah, what a day He hath made, He hath made ! 

It flasheth abright and asweet, and asweet. 

It showeth His love and His smile, yea, His smile. 

The hills stand abrown, aye astand brown. 
And peaked as a monk in his cowl, aye, his cowl! 
The grass it hath seared, aye, hath seared 
And scenteth asweet, yea, asweet. 



RELIGION 239^ 

Ayonder a swallow doth whirl, aye, doth whirl, 
And skim mid the grey o' the blue, 

Aye, the grey o' the blue. 
The young wave doth lap 'pon the sands, 

Yea, lap soft and soft 'pon the sands. 
The field's maid doth seek, yea, doth seek, 
And send out her song to the day. 

Yea, send out her song to the day. 

My heart it is full, yea, 'tis full. 

For the love of Him batheth the day, 

Yea, the love of Him batheth the day. 

Ah, what a day He hath made, 

Yea, He hath made it for me! 

Her prayers are not appeals for aid; they 
are not begging petitions. They are outpour- 
ings of love and trust and gratitude. 

To an old couple, friends of Mr. and Mrs. 
Curran, who passed a round-eyed evening with 
Patience, she said: 

Keep ye within thy heart a song 
And murmur thou this prayer: 

" My God, am I then afraid 
Of heights or depths? 



240 PATIENCE WORTH 

And doth this dark benumb my quaking limbs? 

And do I stop my song in fear 

Lest Thee do then forsake me? 

Nay, for I do love Thee so, 

I fain would choose a song 

Built from my chosen tung. 

And though it be but chattering 

Of a soul bereft of reasoning, 

I know Thou would'st love it as Thine own. 

For I do love Thee so ! " 

This was not given for another, but is her 
own cry: 

I beseech Thee, Lord, for naught ! 
But cry aloud unto the sunlight 
Who bathes the earth in gold 
And boldly breaketh into crannies 
Yet unseen by man : 
Flash thou in flaming sheen \ 
Mine own song of love doth falter 
And my throat, it is afail! 

And thou, the greening shrub along the way, 

And earth at bud-season. 

Do thou then spurt thy shoots 

And pierce the air with loving! 



RELIGION 241 

And age-wabbled brother — 

I do love thee for thy spending, 

And I do gaze in loving at thy face, 

Whereon I find His peace. 

And trace the withered cheek 

For record of His love. 

Around thy lips doth hang 

The child-smile of a trusting heart ; 

And world hath vanished 

From thine eyes, bedimmed 

To gard thee at awakening. 

Thou, too, art of my song of love. 

I beseech Thee, Lord, for naught. 
These hands are Thine for loving, 
And this heart, already Thine, 
Why offer it? 
I beseech Thee, Lord, for naught. 

This one does ask for something, but only to 
know Him: 

Teach me, O God, 

To say, " 'Tis not enough." 

Aye, teach me, Brother, 

To sing, and though the weight 

Be past this strength, 



242 PATIENCE WORTH 

Teach me, God, to say, 
" 'Tis not enough — to pay ! " 



Teach me, God, for I be weak. 

Teach me to learn 

Of strength from Thee. 

Teach me, God, to trust, and do. 
Teach me, O God, no word to pray. 
Teach me, O God, the heart Thou gavest me. 
Teach me, O God, to read thereon. 
Teach me, God, to waste not word. 
Teach me that I be Ye ! 

That last line presents the most impressive 
principle of the religion she expresses, and 
which, we might almost say, she embodies. 
" Who are you? " she was once asked abruptly. 

"I be Him," she replied; "alike to thee. 
Ye be o' Him." 

At another time she said : 

" I be all that hath been, and all that is, all 
that shalt be, for that be He." 

Taken alone this would seem to be a declara- 
tion that she herself was God, but when it is 



RELIGION 243 

read in connection with the previous aflSrma- 
tion it is readily understood. 

" Thou art of Him," she said again, " aye, 
and I be of Him, and ye be of Him, and He 
be all and of all." 

In this prayer, where she says " Teach me, 
O God, no word to pray," it is evident from 
her other prayers that she uses the word pray 
in the sense of "to beg." Her prayers are 
merely expressions of love and gratitude. 

She herself interprets the line, " Teach me, 
O God, to waste not word," in this verse: 

Speak ye a true tongue, 

Or waste ye with words the Soul's song? 

A damning evidence is with wasted words ; 

For need I prate to yonder star 

When hunger fills the world wherein I dwell? 

Cast I a glance so precious as His 

Which wakes at every dawn? 

Speak I a tongue one half so true 

As sighing winds who sing amid 

Aeolian harps strung with siren tress? 

For lo, the sea murmureth a thousand tones, 

Wrung from its world within, 



244* PATIENCE WORTH 

But telle th only of Him, 
And so His silence keeps. 



In the order in which we have chosen to pre- 
sent these poems, they are more and more 
mystical as we go on. We trust, then, that the 
reader meeting them for the first time will feel 
no impertinence in increasing attempts at 
elucidation from one who has read them often 
and pondered them much. 

There is another and a very interesting 
phase of these communications in the place 
Christ holds in them. Patience's attitude to- 
ward the Savior is one of deep and loving 
reverence. 

" Didst thou then," she says, " with those 
drops so worth, buy the throbbing at thy mem- 
ory set aflutter? And is this love of mine so 
freely thine by that same purchase, or do I 
love thee for thy love of me ? And do I, then, 
my father's tilling for love of Him, like thee 
to shed my blood and tears for reapers in an 
age to come, because He wills it so? God 
grant 'tis so! " 



RELIGION 245 

Nor does she hesitate to assert His divinity 
with dejBniteness. " Think ye," she cries, 
" that He who doth send the earth aspin 
athrough the blue depth o' Heaven, be not a 
wonder-god who springeth up where'er He 
doth set a wish! Yea, then doth He to spring 
from out the dust a lily; so also doth He to 
breathe athin (within) the flesh, and come unto 
the earth, born from out flesh athout the touch 
o' man. 'Tis so, and from off the lute o' me 
hath song aflowed that be asweeted o' the 
blood o' Him that shed for thee and me." 

And she puts the same assertion of His 
divine birth into this tribute to the Virgin: 

Mary, mother, thou art the Spring 

That flowereth, though nay man aplanteth thee. 

Mary, mother, the song of thee 

That lulled His dreams to come. 

Sing them athrough the earth and bring 

The hope of rest unto the day. 

Mary, mother, from out the side of Him 

That thou didst bear, aflowed the crimson tide 

That doth to stain e'en unto this day — 



M6 PATIENCE WORTH 

The tide of blood that ebbed the man 
From out the flesh and left the God to be. 

Mary, mother, wilt thou then leave me catch 

These drops, that I do offer them as drink 

Unto the brothers of the flesh of me of earth? 

Mary, mother of the earth's loved! 

Mary, bearer of the God ! 

Mary, that I might call thee of a name befitting 

thee, 
I seek, I seek, I seek, and none 
Doth off^er it to me save this : 
Mother ! Mother ! Mother of the Him ; 
The flesh that died for me. 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 

" Earth ! Earth, the mother of us all ! Aye, the 
mother of us all 1 How loth, how loth, like to a child 
we be, to leave and seek 'mid dark ! " — Patience 
Worth. 

If the personality of Patience Worth and 
the nature and quality of her literary produc- 
tions are worthy of consideration as evidences 
of the truth of her claim to a spiritual exist- 
ence, then in the sufficiency of the proof may 
be found an answer to the world-old question: 
Is there a life after death? To what extent the 
facts that have been presented in this narrative 
may be accepted as proof, is for the reader to 
determine. But Patience has not been content 
to reveal a strange personality and a unique 
literature; she has had much to say upon this 
question of immortality. There is more or less 
spiritual significance in nearly all of her poetry 

247 



248 PATIENCE WORTH 

and in some of her prose, and while her refer- 
ences to the after life are usually veiled under 
figures of speech, they nevertheless give assur- 
ances of its existence. She makes it clear, how- 
ever, that she is not permitted to reveal the 
nature of that life beyond the veil, but she goes 
as far apparently as she dares, in the repeated 
assertion, through metaphor and illustration, 
of its reaUty. 

" My days," she cries, " I have scattered like 
autumn leaves, whirled by raging winds, and 
they have fallen in various crannies .'long the 
way. Blown to rest are the sunny spring- 
kissed mornings of my youth, and with many 
a sigh did I blow the sobbing eves that 
melted into tear- washed night. Blow on, thou 
zephyr of this hfe, and let me throw the value 
of each day to thee. Blow, and spend thyself, 
till, tired, thou wilt croon thyself to sleep. 
Perchance this casting of my day may cease, 
and thou wilt turn anew unto thy blowing and 
reap the casting of the world. 

" What then is a sigh? Ah, man may 
breathe a sorrow. Doth then the dumbness of 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 249 

his brother bar his sighing? Nay — and hark! 
The sea doth sigh, and yonder starry jasmine 
stirreth with a tremorous sigh; and morning's 
birth is greeted with the sighing of the world. 
For what? Ah, for that coming that shall ful- 
fill the promise, and change the sighing to a 
singing, and loose the tongue of him whom 
God doth know and, fearful lest he tell His 
hidden mysteries, hath locked his lips." 

And again she asks : " Needest thou see what 
God himself sealeth thine eyes to make thee 
know? " Meaning, undoubtedly, that only 
through the process of death can the soul be 
brought to an understanding of that other life ; 
and she declares that even if we were shown, 
we could not comprehend. " If thou should'st 
see His face on morrow's break," she says, 
" 'twould but start a wagging," a discussion. 
And she continues: "Ah, ope the tabernacle, 
but look thou not on high, for when the filmy 
veil shall fade away — ah, could'st thou but 
know that He who waits hath looked, aye 
looked, on thee, and thou hast looked on Him 
since time began!" This enigmatical utter- 



250 PATIENCE WORTH 

ance is in itself sufficient to start a " wagging," 
but Patience evidently feels that the solution 
is beyond our powers: for she repeatedly as- 
serts that the key to the mystery is within our 
reach if we could but grasp it. " Fleet as down 
blown from its moorings, seeking the linnet 
who dropped her seed, so drift ye," she says, 
" ever seeking, when at the root still rests the 
seed pod." And again: " Knowest thou that 
fair land to which the traveler is loath to go, 
but loath, so loath, to leave? Ah, the mystery 
of the snail's shell is far deeper than this." 

Yet she tells us again and again that Nature 
itself is the proof of another life. " Why live," 
she asks, " the paltry span of years allotted 
thee, in desolation, while all about thee are His 
promises? Thou art, indeed, like a withered 
hand that holds a new-blown rose." The truth, 
she says, is not to be found in " books of wordy 
filling," but in the infant's smile and in the 
myriad creations and resurrections that are 
ever within our cognizance. " I pipe of learn- 
ing," she cries, " and fall silent before the fool 
who singeth his folly lay." 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 251 

The natural evidences she points out are 
visible to all and within the comprehension of 
the feeblest intelligence, but he whose vision is 
obscured by book knowledge " is like unto the 
monk who prays within his cell, unheedful of 
the timid sunbeam who would light the page 
his vidsdom so befogs." " Ah! " she exclaims, 
" the labor set thee to unlearn thine inborn 
fancies!" meaning, apparently, the suppres- 
sion of the intuitions of immortality ; and in the 
same line of thought she cries : " Am I then 
drunkened on the chaff of knowledge supped 
by mine elderborn? Nay, my forefolk drank 
not truth, but sent through my veins acoursing, 
chaff, chaff, naught by chaff." Plainly, then. 
Patience has no great respect for learning, and 
it is the book of Nature rather than the book 
of words that she would have us read. 

I made a song from the dead notes of His birds, 
And wove a wreath of withered lily buds. 
And gathered daisies that the sun had scorched, 
And plucked a rose the riotous wind had torn. 
And stolen clover flowers, down-trodden by the kine, 
And fashioned into ropes and tied with yellow reed, 



252 PATIENCE WORTH 

An offering unto Him : and lo, the dust 
Of crumbling blossoms fell to bloom again, 
And smiled like sickened children, 
Wistfully, but strong of faith that mother-stalk 
Would send fresh blossoms in the spring. 

So it is she sings, presenting the symbolisms 
of nature to illustrate the renewal or the con- 
tinuance of life ; or again, she likens life to the 
seasons (as did Shakespeare and Keats, and 
many another poet) in this manner: 

My youth is promising as spring, 

And verdant as young weeds. 

Whose very impudence taketh them 

Where bloom the garden's treasures. 

My midlife, like the summer, who blazeth 

As a fire of blasting heat, fed by withered 

Crumbling weeds of my spring. 

My sunset, like the fall who ripeneth 

The season's offerings. And hoar frost 

Is my winter night, fraught with borrowed warmth, 

And flowers, and filled with weeds, 

Which spring e'en 'neath the frozen waste? 

Ah, is the winter then my season's close? 

Or will I pin a faith to hope and look 

Again for spring, who lives eternal in my soul? 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 253 

Faith is the keynote of many of her songs, 
the faith that grows out of that profound love 
which is the essential principle of the religion 
she presents. The triumph of faith she ex- 
presses in the poem which follows: 

sea! The panting bosom of the Earth; 
The sighing, singing carol of her heart t 

1 watch thee and I dream a dream 
Whose fruit doth sicken me. 

White sails do fleck thy sheen, and yonder moon 

Doth seem to dip thy depths 

And sail the silver mirror, high above. 

Unharbored do I rove. Along the shore behind, 

The shadow of Tomorrow creepeth on. 

A seething silvered path doth stretch thy length, 

To meet the curving cheek of Lady Moon. 

I dream the flutt'ring waves to fanning wings 

And fain would follow in their course. But stay! 

My barque doth plow anew, and set the wings to 

flight; 
For though I watch their tremorous mass, my craft 
But saileth harbor-loosed, and ever stretcheth far 
Beyond the moon's own phantom path — 
And I but dream a dream whose fruit doth sicken me. 
Ah, Sea! who planted thee, and cast 
A silver purse, unloosed, upon thy breast .^^ 



254 PATIENCE WORTH 

My barque, who then did harbor it, 

And who unfurled its sail? 

And yonder moon, from whence her silver coaxed? 

Methinks my dream doth wax her wroth, 

Else why the pallor o'er her cast? 

Dare I to sail, to steer me at the wheel? 

Shall I then hide my face and cease my murmuring, 

O'erf earful lest I find the port? 

Nay, I do know thee. Lord, and fearless sail me on. 

To harbor then at dawning of new day. 

I stand unfearful at the prow. 

At anchor rests my barque. Away, thou phantom 

Moon, 
And restless, seething path I 
My chart I cast unto the sea, 
For I do know Thee, Lord! 

This triumph of faith is also the theme of the 
weird allegory which follows. It is, perhaps, 
the most mystical of Patience's productions. 



THE PHANTOM AND THE DREAMER 

Phantom : 

Thick stands the hill in garb of fir, 

And winter-stripped the branching shrub. 

Cold gray the sky, and glistered o'er 

With star-dust pulsing treraorously. 

Snow, the lady of the Winter Knight, 

Hath danced her weary and fallen to her rest. 

She lieth stretched in purity 

And dimpled 'neath the trees. 

A trackless waste doth lie from hill 

To valley 'neath, and Winter's Knight 

Doth sing a wooing lay unto his love. 

Cot on cot doth stand deserted. 
And thro' the purpled dark they show 
Like phantoms of a life long passed 
To nothingness. Hear thou the hoUowness 
Of the sea's coughing beat against 
The cliff beneath, and barken ye 
To the silence of the valley there. 
Doth chafe ye of thy loneliness? 
Then sleep and let me put a dream to thee. 

255 



256 PATIENCE WORTH 

See ye the cot — 
A speck o' dark adown the hillside, 
And sheltered o'er with fir-bows, 
Heavy-laden with the kiss of Lady Snow? 
Come hither then. Let's bruise this snowy breast. 
And fetch us there unto its door. 

See! Here a twig 
Hath battled with the wind, and lost. 
We then may cast it 'mid its brothers 
Of the bush and plow us on. 
Look ye to the thick thatch 
O'er the gable of the roof. 
Piled higher with a blanketing of snow; 
And shutters hang agape, to rattle 
Like the cackle of a crone. 
The blackness of a pit within. 
And filled with sounds that tho' they be 
But seasoning of the log, doth freeze 
Thy marrowmeat. I feel the quake 
And shake thee for thy fear. 

Stride thou within and set a flint to brush 
Within the chimney-place. We then shall rouse 
The memory of the tenant here — 
A night, my friend, thee'lt often call to mind. 
The flame hath sprung and lappeth at the twigs. 
Thee'lt watch the burning of thy hastiness, 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 257 

And wait thee long 

Until the embers slip away to smoke. 

Then strain ye to its weaving 

And spell to me the reading of its folds. 

Dreamer: 

I see thin, threading lines that writhe them 

To a shape — a visage ever changeful, 

Or mine eyes do play me false. 

For it doth smile to twist it to a leer. 

And sadden but to laugh in mockery. 

I see a lad whose face 

Doth shine illumed, and he doth bear 

The kiss of wisdom on his brow. 

I see him travail 'neath a weary load. 

And close beside him Wisdom follows on. 

Burdened not is he. Do I see aright? 

For still the light of wisdom shineth o'er. 

But stay ! What ! Do mine eyes then cheat ? 

This twisting smoke-wreath 

Filleth all too much my sight! 

Phantom : 

Nay, friend, strain thee now anew. 

The lad! Now canst thou see? 

Nay, for like to him 

Thou hast looked thee at the face of Doubt.' 



^58 PATIENCE WORTH 

Dreamer: 

Who art thou, shape or phantom, then, 
That thou canst set my dream to flight? 
I doubt me that the lad could stand 
Beneath the load ! 

Phantom : 

Nay, thee canst ravel well, my friend. 

The lad was thee, and Doubt 

O'ertook with Wisdom on thy way. 

Come, bury Doubt aneath the ash. 

We travel us anew. 

Seest thou, a rimming moon doth show 

From 'neath the world's beshadowed side. 

A night bird chatteth to its mate, 

And lazily the fir-boughs wave. 

We track us to the cot whose roof 

Doth sag — and why thy shambling tread? 

I bid ye on ! 

Dreamer: 

Who art thou — again I that demand- 
That I shall follow at thy bidding? 
Who set me then this task? 

Phantom: 

Step thou within! 

Stand thee on the thresh of this roofless void ! 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY £59 

Look thou! Dost see the maid 
Who coyly stretcheth forth her hand 
To welcome thee? She biddeth thee 
To sit and sup. I bid thee speak. 
Awaken thee unto her welcoming. 

Dreamer: 

Enough! This fancy-breeding sickeneth 

My very soul! A skeleton of murdered trees. 

Ribbed with pine and shanked of birch ! 

And thee wouldst bid me then 

Embrace the emptiness. 

I see naught, and believe but what I see. 

Phantom: 

Look thou again, and strain. 

What seest thou? 

Dreamer: 

I see a newly kindled fire, 

And watch its burning glow until 

The embers die and send their ghosts aloft. 

But ash remaineth — and I chill ! 

For rising there, a shape 

Whose visage twisteth drunkenly, 

And from her garments falls a dust of ash. 



260 PATIENCE WORTH 

Phantom: 

Doubt! Unburied, friende! We journey on, 

And mark ye well each plodding footfall 

Singing like to golden metal with the frost. 

The night a scroll of white, and lined 

With blackish script — 

The lines of His own putting! 

Read thee there ! Thou seest naught. 

And believe but what ye see ! 

Stark nakedness and waste — but hearken ye ! 

The frost skirt traileth o'er the crusted snow 

And singeth young leaves' songs of Spring. 

Still art thou blind ! 

But at His touching shall the darkness bud 

And bloom to rosy morn. And even now, 

Were I to snap a twig 'twould bleed and die. 

See ye ; 'tis done ! Look ye ! 

Ye believe but what ye see : 

Here within thy very hand 

Thou boldest Doubt's undoing. 

I bid ye look upon the bud 

Already gathered 'neath the tender bark. 

The sun's set and rise hath coaxed it forth. 

Thee canst see the rogue hath stolen red 

And put it to its heart. And here 

Aneath the snow the grass doth love the earth 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 261 

And nestles to her breast. 

I stand me here, and lo, the Spring hath broke! 

The dark doth slip away to hide, 

And flowering, singing, sighing, loving Spring 

Is here! 

Dreamer: 

Aye, thou art indeed 

A wonder-worker in the night ! 

A black pall, a freezing blast. 

An unbroken path — and thou 

Wouldst have me then to prate o' Spring, 

And pluck a bud where dark doth hide the bush! 

Who Cometh from the thicket higher there? 

Phantom : 

'Tis Doubt to meet thee, friend! 

Dreamer: 

Who art thou? I fain would flee, 
And yet I fear to leave lest I be lost. 
I hate thee and thy weary task! 

Phantom: 

Nay, brother, thy lips do spell. 

But couldst thee read their words aright 

Thee wouldst meet again with Doubt. 

Come! We journey on unto the cot 



262 PATIENCE WORTH 

Beloved the most by me. I bid thee 

Let thy heart to warm within thy breast. 

A thawing melteth frozen Hope. 

See how, below, the sea hath veiled 

Her secret held so close, 

And murmured only to the winds 

Who woo her ever and anon. 

The waves do lap them, hungry for the sands. 

Careful! Lest the sun's pale rise 

Should blind thee with its light. 

A shaft to put it through 

The darkness of thy soul must needs 

But be a glimmering to blind. 

Step ye to the hearthstone then, 

And set thee there a flame anew. 

I bid ye read again 

The folding of the smoke. 

Dreamer: 

'Tis done, thou fiend ! 

A pretty play for fools, indeed. 

I swear me that 'tis not 

For loving of the task I builded it, 

But for the warming of its glow. 

Phantom: 

In truth ye speak. But read! 



THE roEAS ON IMMORTALITY 263 

Dreamer: 

I see a hag whose brow 

Doth wrinkle like a summer sea. 

For do I look unto the sea 

At Beauty's own fair form, 

It writheth to a twisted shape, 

And I do doubt me of her loveliness. 

The haggard visage of the crone 

I now behold, doth set me doubting 

Of mine eye, for dimples seem 

To flutter 'neath the wrinkled cheek. 

Phantom : 

So, then, thee believes t 

But what thine eyes behold! 

Thee findest then 

Thy seeing in a sorry plight. 

I marvel at thy wisdom, lad. 

Look ye anew. Mayhap thee then 

Canst coax the crone away. 

Dreamer: 

Enough! The morn hath kissed the night adieu. 

And even while I prate 

A redwing crimsoneth the snow in flight. 

Kindled tinder smoldereth away. 

And I do strain me to its fold. 



264 PATIENCE WORTH 

I glut me of the loveliness I there behold, 

For from the writhing stream a sprite is bom 

Whose beauteous form bedazzles me, 

And she doth point me 

To the golding gray of morn. The sea 

Is singing, singing her unto my soul. 

I dreamed she sighed, but waked to hear her sing. 

I hear thee. Phantom, bidding me on, on ! 

But mom hath stolen dreams away. 

I strain me to the hills to trace our path, 

And lo, unbroken is the snow. 

And cots have melted with the light. 

And yet, methinks a murmuring doth come 

From out the echoes of the night. 

That hid them 'neath the crannies of the hills. 

Life ! Life ! I lead thee on ! 

And faith doth spring from seedlings of thy doubt! 

Epilogue. 

Thick stands the hill in garb of fir and snow. 
The Lady of the Winter's Knight hath danced 
Her weary, and stretched her in her purity. 
To cover aching wounds of Winter's overloving woo. 



"And faith doth spring from seedlings of 
thy doubt! " plainly meaning an active doubt 
that searches for the truth and finds it. But 
she personifies Doubt in another and more for- 
bidding form in this : 

Like to a thief who wrappeth him 

Within the night-tide's robe, 

So standeth the specter o' the Earth; 

Yea, he doth robe him o' the Earth's fair store. 

Yea, he decketh in the star-hung purple o' the eve, 

And reacheth from out the night unto the morn, 

And wringeth from her waking all her gold, 

And at his touching, lo, the stars are dust. 

And morn's gold but heat's glow, and ne'er 

The golden blush of His own metal store. 

Yea, he strideth then 
Upon the flower-hung couches of the field, 
And traileth him thereon his robe. 
And lo, the flowers do die of thirst 
And parch of scoarching of his breath. 

265 



266 PATIENCE WORTH 

Yea, and 'mid the musics of the earth he strideth him, 

And full-songed throats are mute. 

Yea, music dieth of his luring glance. 

And e'en the love of earth he seeketh out 

And turneth it unto a folly-play. 

Yea, beneath his glance, the fairy frost 

Upon the love sprite's wing 

Doth flutter, as a dust, and drop, and leave 

But bruised and broken bearers for His store. 

Yea, and 'mid man's day he ever strideth him 
And layeth low man's reasoning. His robes 
Are hung of all the earth's most loved. 
From off the flowers their fresh ; from off the day 
The fairness of her hours. For dark, and hid 
Beneath his cloak, he steppeth ever, 
And doth hiss his name to thee — 
Doubt. 

I have said that the message of Patience 
Worth contained a revelation, a religion and a 
promise. The revelation is too obvious to need 
a pointer. In the preceding chapter were pre- 
sented the elements of the religion that she re- 
veals, with which should be included the un- 
faltering faith expressed in these poems. Love 
and Faith — these are the two Graces upon 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 261 

whom, to personify them, all her work is rested, 
and from them spring the promiss she conveys. 
That promise has to do with the hereafter, and 
Patience knows the human attitude in relation 
to that universal problem, and she gives cour- 
age to the shrinking heart in this poem on the 
fear of death: 

I stride abroad before my brothers like a roaring lion, 
Yet at even's close from whence cometh the icy hand 
That clutcheth at my heart and maketh me afraid — 
The slipping of myself away, I know not whither? 

And lo, I fall atremble. 
When I would grasp a straw, 'tis then I find it not. 
Can I then trust me on this journey lone 
To country I deem peopled, but know not? 
My very heart declareth faith, yet hath not thine 
Been touched and chilled by this same phantom? 
Ah, through the granite sips the lichen — 
And hast thou not a long dark journey made? 
Why fear? As cloud wreaths fade 
From spring's warm smile, so shall fear 
Be put to flight by faith. 

I pluck me buds of varied hue and choose the violet 
To weave a garland for my loved and best. 



268 PATIENCE WORTH 

I search for bloom among the rocks 

And find but feathery plume. 
I weave, and lo, the blossoms fade 

Before I reach the end, 
And faded lie amid my tears — 

And yet I weave and weave. 
I search for jewels 'neath the earth, 

And find them at the dawn. 
Besprinkled o'er the rose and leaf. 
And showered by the sparrow's wing, 
Who seeketh 'mid the dew-wet vine 

A harbor for her home. 
I search for truth along the way 

And find but dust and web, 
And in the smile of infant lips 

I know myself betrayed. 
I watch the swallow skim across the blue 

To homelands of the South, 
And ah, the gnawing at my heart doth cease; 

For how he wings and wings 
To lands he deemeth peopled by his brothers, 
Whose song he hears in flight I 
Not skimming on the lake's fair breast is he, 
But winging on and on. 
And dim against the feathery cloud 

He fades into the blue. 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 269 

I stand with withered blossoms crushed, 
And weave and weave and weave. 

This is Patience's answer to the eternal 
question : 

Can I then trust me on this journey lone 
To country I deem peopled, but know not? 

It is the cry of him who believes and yet 
doubts, and Patience points to the swallow 
winging across the blue " to lands he deemeth 
peopled with his brothers " who have gone on 
before. In imagination he can hear their song 
in the home lands of the South, and though he 
cannot see them, and cannot have had word 
from them, he knows they are there, and he 
does not skim uncertainly about the lake, but 
with unfaltering faith " wings him on and on " 
until — 

Dim against the feathery cloud 
He fades into the blue. 

But Patience does not content herself with 
appeals to faith, eloquent as they may be. 



270 PATIENCE WORTH 

While her communications are always clothed 
in figures of speech, they are sometimes more 
definite in statement than in the lines which 
have been thus far presented. In the prose 
poem which follows, she asks and answers the 
question in a way that can leave no doubt of 
her meaning: 

" Shall I arise and know thee, brother, when 
like a bubble I am blown into Eternity from 
this pipe of clay? Or shall I burst and float 
my atoms in a joyous spray at the first behold- 
ing of this home prepared for thee and me, 
and shall we together mingle our joys in one 
supreme joy in Him? It matters not, beloved, 
so comfort thee. For should the blowing be 
the end, what then? Hath not thy pack been 
full, and mine? We are o'erweary with the 
work of living, and sinking to oblivion would 
be rest. Yet sure as sun shall rise, my dust 
shall be unloosed, and blow into new fields of 
new days. I see full fields yet to be harvested, 
and I am weary. I see fresh business of living, 
work yet to be done, and I am weary. Oh, let 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY ^71 

me fold these tired hands and sleep. Beloved, 
I trust, and expect my trust, for ne'er yet did 
He fail." 

She puts this into the mouth of one who 
lives, but it is not merely an expression of 
faith; it is a positive assertion. " Yet sure as 
sun shall rise, my dust shall be unloosed, and 
blow into new fields of new days." 

And again she sings: 

What carest, dear, should sorrow trace 

Where dimples sat, and should 

Her dove-gray cloud to settle 'neath thine eye ? 

The withering of thy curving cheek 

Bespeaks the spending of thy heart. 

Lips once full are bruised 

By biting of restraint. Wax wiser, dear. 

To wane is but to rest and rise once more. 

Or she puts the thought in another form in 
this assurance: 

Weary not, O brother! 

'Tis apaled, the sun's gold sink. 

Then weary not, but set thy path to end, 

E'en as the light doth fade and leave 



272 PATIENCE WORTH 

Nay trace to mar the night's dark tide. 
Sink thou, then, as doth the sun, 
Assured that thou shalt rise! 

All these, however, are but preparatory to 
the communication in which she asserts not 
only the actuality of the future life but some- 
thing of the nature of it. One might say that 
the preceding poems and prose-poems, taken 
alone and without regard to the mystery of 
their source, were merely expressions of belief, 
but in this communication she seems to speak 
with knowledge, seems even to have over- 
stepped the bounds within which, she has often 
asserted, she is held. " My lips be astopped," 
she has said in answer to a request for informa- 
tion of this forbidden character, but here she 
appears to have been permitted to give a 
glimpse of the unknown, and to present a 
promise of universal application. This poem, 
from the spiritual standpoint, is the most re- 
markable of all her productions. 

How have I caught at fleeting joys 
And swifter fleeting sorrows! 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 273 

And days and nights, and morns and eves, 

And seasons, too, aslipping thro' the years, afleet. 

And whither hath their trend then led? 

Ah, whither I 

How do I to stop amid the very pulse o' life. 
Afeared ! Yea, fear clutcheth at my very heart ! 
For what ? The night ? Nay, night doth shimmer 
And flash the jewels I did count 
E'er fear had stricken me. 

The morn? Nay, I waked with morn atremor, 

And know the day-tide's every hour. 

How do I then to clutch me 

At my heart, afeared? 

The morrow? Nay, 

The morrow but bringeth old loves 

And hopes anew. 

Ah, woe is me, 'tis emptiness, aye, naught — 
The bottomlessness o' the pit that doth af right! 
Afeared? Aye, but driven fearless on! 

What ! Promise ye 'tis to mart I plod? 
What! Promise ye new joys? 
Ah, but should I sleep, to waken me 
To joys I ne'er had supped! 



a74j PATIENCE WORTH 

I see me stand abashed and timid, 
As a child who cast a toy beloved, 
For bauble that but caught the eye 
And left the heart ahungered. 

What ! Should I search in vain 
To find a sorrow that had fleeted hence 
Afore my coming and found it not? 
Ah, me, the emptiness ! 

And what! should joys that but a prick 

Of gladness dealt, and teased my hours 

To happiness, be lost amid this promised bliss? 

Nay, I clutch me to my heart 

In fear, in truth! 

Do harken Ye ! And cast afearing 

To the wiles of beating gales and wooing breeze. 

I find me throat aswell and voice attuned. 

Ah, let me then to sing, for j oy consumeth me ! 

I've builded me a land, my mart. 

And fear hath slipped away to leave me sing. 

I sleep, and feel afloating. 
Whither! Whither! To wake,— 
And wonder warmeth at my heart, 
I've waked in yester-year! 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 275 

What! Ye? And what! Fst thou? 

Ah, have I then slept, to dream? Come, 

Ne'er a dream-wraith looked me such a welcoming ! 

'Twas yesterday this hand wert then afold, 

And now, — ah, do I dream? 

'Tis warm-pressed within mine own! 

Dreams ! Dreams ! And yet, we've met afore ! 

I see me flitting thro' this vale. 

And tho' I strive to spell 

The mountain's height and valley's depth, 

I do but fall afail. 

Wouldst thou then drink a potion 

Were I to offer thee an empty cup? 

Couldst thou to pluck the rainbow from the sky? 

As well, then, might I spell to thee. 

But I do promise at the waking, 
Old joys, and sorrows ripened to a mellow heart. 
And e'en the crime-stained wretch, abasked in light, 
Shall cast his seed and spring afruit! 

Then do I cease to clutch the emptiness 
And sleep, and sleep me unaf eared! 

What is it that affrights, she asks, when we 
think of death? It is the emptiness, she an- 



276 PATIENCE WORTH 

swers, the utter lack of knowledge of what 
lies beyond. And if we waken to " joys we 
ne'er have supped " — using the word sup in 
the sense of to taste or to know — what is there 
to attract us in the prospect? It is an illustra- 
tion she presents of our attitude toward prom- 
ises of joys with which we are unfamiliar; and 
which therefore do not greatly interest us — 
the child who casts aside a well beloved toy 
" for bauble that but caught the eye and left 
the heart ahungered." Shall the joys, she 
makes us exclaim, which we have known here 
but barely tasted in this fleeting life, " be 
lost amid this promised bliss!" and shall we 
" search in vain to find a sorrow that had 
fleeted hence before our coming? " — ^meaning, 
apparently, shall we look there in vain for a 
loved one who has gone before? She answers 
these questions of the heart. Personality per- 
sists beyond the grave, she gives us plainly to 
understand. We take with us all of ourselves 
but the material elements. " Thou art ye," 
she has said, " and I be me and ye be ye, aye, 
ever so." The transition is but a change from 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY ^77 

the material to the spiritual. We " wake in 
yesteryear," she says, — amid the friends and 
associations of the past; and the joys of that 
life, one must infer, are the spiritual joys of 
this one, the joy that comes from love, from 
good deeds, from work accomplished. For it 
is quite evident that she would have us believe 
that there is a continuous advancement in that 
other life. 

And e'en the crime-stained wretch, abasked in light. 
Shall cast his seed and spring afruit. 

This can mean nothing else than that the 
hardened sinner, amid supernal influences, 
shall develop into something higher, and as no 
one can be supposed to be perfect when leaving 
earth, it follows that progress is common to all. 
Progress implies effort, and this indicates that 
there will be something for everyone to do — a 
view quite different from the monotony of 
eternal idleness. 

But this I promise at the waking, 

Old joys, and sorrows ripened to a mellow heart. 



^78 PATIENCE WORTH 

To those who would peer into the other land 
these are perhaps the most important lines she 
has given. But what does she mean by " sor- 
rows ripened to a mellow heart? " She was 
asked to make that plainer and she said : 

" That that hath flitted hence be sorrows of 
earth, and ahere be ripened and thine. Love 
alost be sorrow of earth and dwell ahere." 

She thus makes these lines an answer to the 
question put before: 

What! Should I search in vain 
To find a sorrow that had fleeted hence 
Afore my coming and found it not? 

These are the sorrows that are " ripened 
to a mellow heart," and she was asked if there 
were new sorrows to be borne in that other 
life. She replied: 

" Nay. Earth be a home of sorrow's dream. 
For sorrow be but dream of the soul asleep. 
'Tis wake (death) that setteth free." 

And after such assurance comes the cry of 
faith and content and peace: 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 279 

Then do I cease to clutch the emptiness, 
And sleep, and sleep me unaf eared! 

With this comforting assurance in mind one 
may cheerfully approach her solemn address 
to Death: 

Who art thou. 

Who tracketh 'pcfn the path o' me — 

O' each turn, aye, and track? 

Thou I And thou astand! 

And o'er thy face a cloud, 

Aye, a darked and somber cloud ! 

Who art thou, 

Thou tracker 'mid the day's bright, 

And 'mid the night's deep; 

E'en when I be astopped o' track? 

Who art thou. 

That toucheth o' the flesh o' me, 

And sendeth chill unto the heart o' me? 

Aye, and who art thou, 

Who putteth forth thy hand 

And setteth at alow the hopes o' me? 

Aye, who art thou. 

Who bideth ever 'mid a dream? 



^80 PATIENCE WORTH 

Aye, and that the soul o' me 
Doth shrink at know? 



Who art thou ? Who art thou, 
Who steppeth ever to my day, 
And blotteth o' the sun away? 

Who art thou. 

Who stepped to Earth at birth o' me, 

And e'en 'mid wail o' weak, 

Aye, at the birth o' wail. 

Did set a chill 'pon infant flesh ; 

And at the track o' man 'pon Earth 

Doth follow ever, and at height afollow. 

And doth touch, 

And all doth crumble to a naught. 

Thou! Thou! Who art thou? 

Ever do I to ask, and ever wish 

To see the face o' thee, 

And ne'er, ne'er do I to know thee — 

Thou, the Traveler 'pon the path o' me. 

And, Brother, thou dost give 

That which world doth hold 

From see o' me! 

Stand thou ! Stand thou ! 

And draw thy cloak from o'er thy face I 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 281 

Ever hath the dread o' thee 
Clutched at the heart o' me. 
Aje, and at the end o' journey, 
I beseech thee, 

Cast thy cloak and show thee me! 
Aye, show thee me! 

Ah, thou art the gift o' Him! 

The Key to There 1 The Love o' Earth! 

Aye, and Hate hath made o' man 

To know thee not — 

Thou! Thou! O Death! 

She finds Death terrible from the human 
point of view, and reveals him at the end as 
" the gift of Him, the Key to There! " 

One of her constant objects seems to be to 
rob death of its terrors, and to bring the 
" There " into closer and more intimate con- 
nection with us. Here is another effort: 

Spring's morn afulled o' merry-song, 
Aye, and tickle o' streams-thread through Summer's 
noon; 

Arock o' hum o' hearts-throb. 

And danced awhite the air at scorch; 



282 PATIENCE WORTH 

Winter's rage asing o' cold 

And wail o' Winter's sorry at the Summer's 
leave ; 

Ashivered breeze, abear o' leaf's rustling 
At dry o' season's ripe; 

Night's deep, where sound astarteth silence; 
Mom's sweet, awooed by bird's coax. 

Earth's sounds, ye deem? 

I tell thee 'tis but the echoing o' Here. 

Thy days be naught 
Save coax o' Here athere \ 

All that is worth while on earth is but the 
echoes of Heaven, and there would be noth- 
ing to life but for the joys that have been 
" coaxed " from there. How closely that 
thought unites the here and the there. Earth 
sounds but the echoes of the other land adjoin- 
ing! She makes it something tangible, some- 
thing almost material, something we may 
nearly comprehend; and then, having opened 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 283 

the door a little way, as far, no doubt, as it is 
possible for her to do, she presents this re- 
sponse to human desires, this promise of joys 
to come : 

Swift as light-flash o' storm, swift, swift, 

Would I send the wish o' thine asearch. 

Swift, swift as bruise o' swallows' wing 'pon air, 

I'd send asearch thy wish, areach to lands unseen; 

I'd send aback o' answer laden. 

Swift, swift, would I to flee unto the Naught 

Thou knowest as the Here. 

Swift, swift I'd bear aback to thee 

What thou wouldst seek. Swift, swift. 

Would I to bear aback to thee. 

Dost deem the path ahid doth lead to naught? 

Dost deem thy footfall leadest thee to nothing- 
ness ? 

Dost pin not 'pon His word o' promising, 

And art at sorry and afear to follow Him.'^ 

I'd put athin thy cup a sweet, a pledge o' love's- 
buy. 

I'd send aback a glad-song o' this land. 

Sing thou, sing on, though thou art ne'er aheard — 

Like love awaked, the joy o' breath 

Anew born o' His loving. 



284f PATIENCE WORTH 

Set thee at rest, and trod the path unfearing. 

For He who putteth joy to earth, aplanted joy 

Athin the reach o' thee, e'en through 

The dark o' path at end o' journey. 

His smile! His word! His loving! 

Put forth thy hand at glad, and I do promise thee 

That Joy o' earth asupped shall fall as naught. 

And thou shalt sup thee deep o' joys, 

O' Bearer, aye, and Source ; and like glad light o' day 

And sweet o' love, thy coming here shall be! 

With this promise, this covenant, we bring 
the narrative of Patience to an end. There 
will be many and widely varied views of the 
natm*e of this intelligence, but sm^ely there can 
be but one opinion of the beauty of her words 
and the purity of her purpose. She has 
brought a message of love at a time when the 
world is sadly deficient in that attribute, wisely 
believed to be the best thing in earth or heaven ; 
and an inspiration to faith that was never so 
greatly in need of strength as now. An in- 
evitable consequence of the world- war will be a 
universal introspection. There will be a great 
turning of thought to serious things. That 



THE IDEAS ON IMMORTALITY 285 

tendency is already discernible. May it not be 
possible that it is the mission of Patience 
Worth to answer the question that is above all 
questions at a time when humanity is filled 
with interrogation? 



FINIS. 



INDEX 



Affection, 46 

Allegory, on faith (verse), 

255-266 
Anatomist. See Teacher of 

anatomy 
Anglo-Saxon, 104 
Anne, 145, 146 
Ape, 112, 117 
Aphorisms, 19 
Attunement, 203 
Autumn (verse), 82, 83, 84 

B., Mrs., 182 
Babe, parable of a, 168 
Bartman, parable of a, 165 
Basketmaker, parable of the, 

167 
Beppo, 112 
Birth of a Song (verse), 86, 

87 
Blank verse, 21, 64, 107 
Book learning, 251 
Books, 60 
Botanist. See Teacher of 

botany 
Brew, 185 
" Builder of dreams" (verse), 

85, 86 
Burke, 89 

Capital punishment, 217 
Carrington, W. T., quoted, 6 
Charlie, Prince, 145, 146 
Childhood, tone of, 51 
Christ, 122 

Attitude toward, 244 
Christmas (verse), 99 
Christmas story, 122, 123- 

141 
Cloak, parable of the, 171 



Cockshut, 57 

Communications, character, 
32, 202, 203 
Genuineness, 33, 39, 41 
Intellectual character, 9, 11 
Method, 187 
Compliments, 49 
Composition, method, 66, 67, 

80, 164, 185 
Conversations, character, 173, 
174 
Substance in her words, 
211 
Cup, 224, Q25 
Curran, John H., 53, 178, 

199 
Curran, Mrs. John H., 3, 4, 
14, 31, 41, 45, 46, 182, 
187, 188, 189, 201, 205 
Education, 34 
Sittings, 35, 36 

D., Dr. and Mrs., 207-212 

Day, paean to the (verse), 84 

Death, fear of, 196 

Fear of (verse), 267-269 
Life following, 79 
robbed of terrors, 281 
Solemn address to (verse), 
279-281 

Devotional verse, 97 

Divinity of the human, 245 

Doubt (verse), 365 

Dougal, 145, 146 

Drama, 109 

Six-act medieval play de- 
scribed, 142 

Dress, references to, 52, 56, 
192 



287 



^88 



INDEX 



Dreams. See " Builder of 

dreams " 

See Phantom also 
Dreamer (verse), 7^, 73 

Earth questions, reasoning 

upon, 217 
Eastern morn, 144, 145 
England, 15, 33, 149 

Northern, 60 
Epigrams. See Aphorisms 
Ermaline, Princess, 145, 146 

Failures in life, 227 

Fairy's wand, parable of, 168 

Faith, allegory on (verse), 

255-266 
Triumph of (verse), 253- 

266 
Femininity, 42, 52 
Flesh. See Soul 
Folly, 221, 222 
Fool, 112 
Fool and the Lady, The 

(story), 109, 111-121 
Franco, 151 

Friendship (verse), 96 
Fun-loving spirit, 53 
Future. See Immortality 

G., Miss, 207 
G., Mr., 208 
G., Mrs., 207 
God, 226 

Identity with, 242 

Love for (verse), 237-239 

Song of, 193 

"Hands" (verse), 233 
Harp (verse), 86, 87 
Herbs, story of the, 212-215 
Holmes, John Haynes, quoted, 

10 
Hours of day (verse), 215 
Housekeeping, 42 
Humor, 31 

in verse, 74, 75, 76 
Hutchings, Mr., 53 



Hutchings, Mrs. Emily Grant, 
4, 44, 188 

Imagery, 72, 78 
Immortality, growth, 277 

Mysterjr, 249, 250 

Nature, 272 

Reality, 247 

Recognition of friends, 
270, 276 
Impatience, 45, 46 
Individuality, 41 
Infancy, 92, 94 
Inn of Falcon Feather, 111 

J., Miss, 189, 192, 193 
James, Wm., 199, 200 
Jana, 127 

Jane-o'-apes, 58, 131 
John the Peaceful, 122, 123, 

132 
Joy, promise of future, 283- 

284 

K., Dr., 195, 199 

King of Wisdom, 221 
Kirtle, 55, 56 

Language, 13, 56, 104, 149, 

150, 153, 164, 189 
Laughter, 168 
Leaf, fallen (verse), 82 
Leta, 124 

Life for a life, 218 
Life likened to the seasons 

(verse), 252 
Lisa, 109, 112 
Literature, 223, 224 
Love, childhood, 51 

Divine (verse), 235, 236 

for Christ, 244 

for the loveless (verse), 226 

for the wearied (verse), 
227 

Friendly, 96 

God's (verse), 97 

Man and woman (verse), 
94 



INDEX 



289 



Love, maternal, 92, 94 

Religious, 226 

Song, " Drink ye unto me," 
180 

to God (verse), 237-239 

Universal, 234 
"Loves of yester's day" 

(verse), 88 
Lullaby, 64, example, 68 

Spinning Wheel, 69 

M., Mr. and Mrs., 207-210 

Marion, 153 

Mary, the Virgin, 245 

Marye, Lady, 122, 123 

Massinger, 58 

Maxims. See Aphorisms 

Men, attitude toward, 49 

Men and women, 94 

Merchants, parable of, 166 

Message, 224 

Metaphor, borrowed, 78, 79 

Metaphysics, 29 

Mise-man song, 179 

Mission, 284 

Mite and the Seeds, tale of 

the, 176-178 
Musician, 208 

Nature, Love of, 25, 79 

Value of, 251 
Neurologist, 204 
New England, 15, 33 
New Year (verse), 101 
Newspaper article, 215 
Newspaper writer, 189 

Ouija board, 1, 5, 65, 187 

P., Dr., 204-207 
Parables, 165 

Story of the herbs, 212-215 
Personality, 59 
Pettieskirt, 5% 54, 56, 154, 

186, 205 
Phantom and the Dreamer, 

The (verse), 255-266 
Physicians, 204 



Physician, conversation with 

a young, 16 
Description, 50 
Poetry. See Songs; Verse 
Pollard, Mrs. Mary E., 5, 43, 

44 
Prayers, Character, 239, 243 
Examples (verse), 239-244 
" Primrose path," 77, 78 
Prose, 107 
Psychic communications. See 

Communications 
Puritan, 55, 59, 69, 192 
"Put," 186-189 



R., Dr., 204-207 

Records of communications, 

character, 3 
Regal, 123 
Religion, 223, 226 
Revelation, 225, 226 
Rhyme, 21, 64 
Rhythm, 107 

Sarcasm, 49 

Scottish, 60 

Seed, 224, 225 

Seeds. See Mite and the 

Seeds 
Self, 221, 222 
Shakespeare, 57, 77, 104 
Shelley, 90, 105 
Simplicity 104, 105 
Sittings, character, 18, 35 
Skylark (verse), 89 
Society for Psychical Re- 
search, 223 
Song, birth of a (verse), 86, 

87 
Songs, 173 

"Do I love the morn? "215 

" Drink ye unto me," 180 

*'Gone, gone," 198 

" How have I sought ! " 203 

"Loth as Night," 211 

Mise-man, 179 

To Miss J,, 193 

To Mr. G., a musician, 208 



290 



INDEX 



Sorrow, comfort for, 231 
" Sorrows ripened to a mel- 
low heart," 2T5, 278 
Soul, 190 

Body and, 218 
Spelling, 66 
Spinning, 206 

Spinning Wheel (verse), 69 
Spinster, 49, 69 
Spirituality, 24, 152 
Spring (verse), 81 
Stories, 108 

Character, 185 

Dramatic character, 109 
Story of Telka, described, 149 
"Story of the Judge Bush," 

153-163 
Stranger, The (story), 108, 

122, 123-141 
Subconsciousness, 34, 35 

Teacher of anatomy, 182, 190 

Teacher of botany, 183 

Telka, 149, 150 

Theater, 53 

Throb, 202 

Timon, 124 

Tina, 124 

Tonio, 113 

Tournament, 114 

Tricksters, 208 

Triviality, 10 

Truth, 182 

v.. Dr., 195-201 
Verse, 21 

Dictation, manner, 65 

Range, 63 

Technique, 65, 81 
Virgin Mary, 245 

W., Dr., 176, 178 



W., Mrs., 176, 178, 182 

War, 284 

War (verse) s 91 

"Waste of earth" (verse), 
228-231 

Wasted words, 243 

Wearied ones, 227 

"Weaving," 175 

Widow, visitor at the Cur- 
rans, 217, 218 

Wind (verse), 75 

Winter (verse), 79, 80 

Wisdom, 222 

Wit, 18, 19 

Worth, Patience, advent, 2 
affection, 46; appearance 
207; book learning, 60 
date, 37, 197; elusiveness 
60; femininity, 42, 52 
fun-loving spirit, 53 
impatience, 45, 46; in- 
dividuality, 41; laughter, 
love of, 168; love her in- 
spiration, 234; men, atti- 
tude toward, 49; mes- 
sage, 224; mission, 284, 
285; obscurity, 199; on 
being investigated, 196; 
personality, 12, 59, 220, 
224 ; phrases, striking, 
40; place, 38; revelation, 
226; sarcasm, 49; speech, 
39, 56, 104, 149, 150, 153, 
164j 189; spinster, 49, 69; 
substance in her words, 
211 

X., Dr., 182-195, 204 
X., Mrs., 182, 183 

Z., Dr., 187-189 



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